PAKATAN Harapan (PH) will file suit this week to challenge Putrajaya’s emergency declaration, said Selayang MP William Leong. 

The PKR rep said he will meet with his lawyers before starting the legal process. 

“I met my lawyers last week and everyone was given a task. We are going to meet again (sometime this week) to look at the progress. There are few issues that we need to look at,” Leong told The Malaysian Insight.

“We are working on it but our target (to send an application for the challenge) is this week and we’re hoping to get everything in order.”

Last week Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced a state of emergency in Malaysia less than a day after imposing a lockdown on large parts of the country. 

Muhyiddin said parliament will be suspended while elections will be held as soon as the epidemic was over.

He denied the move was an attempt to cling on to power after he lost majority support in parliament. Instead, emergency rule was established to his government more powers to bring the health crisis under control, he said.

On Sunday, PKR president Anwar Ibrahim said the opposition was planning to challenge the emergency declaration in court, after announcing that he would appeal to the Agong to defend the federal constitution and the rakyat against the government’s abuse of power.

Also on Sunday, several MPs told The Malaysian Insight that PH and Pejuang lawmakers were planning to appeal to Yang di-Pertuan Agong Al-Sultan Abdullah Ri’ayatuddin Al-Mustafa Billah Shah to revoke the proclamation of a state of emergency.

Anwar said last week he had sent a memo to the lawmakers to urge the king to revoke the emergency order and call for parliament to convene as soon as possible.

The opposition leader said Muhyiddin’s decision was invalid because the prime minister did not have the support of parliament.

Anwar said existing legal provisions as well as the MCo were sufficient to curb the spread of the disease. – January 19, 2021.