MUDA’S election candidates will be determined by a special committee instead of the party president or top leaders.

Party information chief Luqman Long told The Malaysian Insight that the Candidate Selection Committee (JPC) will thoroughly screen the candidates before assigning them seats.

“If you look at other parties, the candidates are determined by the president and the central leadership, but at Muda we want to institutionalise the way our party chooses candidates.

“We want a candidate who already has a good performance record with the community and the people; the target, of course, is for Muda to win the general election.

“Muda is in the process of establishing a JPC which will be finalised next week,” Luqman said.

He said the JPC will consist of party president Syed Saddiq Abdul Rahman, central leaders, state representatives, and members of the strategy and political bureaus.

He added tha youth and women candidates are wanted.

The 27-year-old lawyer said the process is to ensure that only qualified individuals are nominated and issues arising after nomination are minimised.

This means that the process of selection will take longer than usual.

“Some ask if this will delay the process of finding candidates. That’s right; it will be a bit slow but we prefer to make the process transparent,” he said.

“We don’t want to find that after we have selected a candidate, he or she has a problem with working as a team or going out to meet people, for example.

“We don’t want that to happen. Instead of worrying, it’s better to prepare early.”

Muda holds the Muar parliamentary seat via its president Syed Saddiq and the Puteri Wangsa state seat through Amirah Aisyah Abdul Aziz.

The party has a membership of around 80,000 and aims to increase this to 150,000 by the end of the year.

Luqman said Muda aims to field many young candidates to fight the old guard.

“Muda was established after the Sheraton Move; people were tired of the political situation, politicians jumping parties,” he said, referring to the defection of Bersatu and PKR members from Pakatan Harapan in 2020.

“That’s why Muda was created – to oppose old and outdated politics.” – August 9, 2022.