YOUTH-BASED party Muda will be contesting the Tapah parliamentary seat, taking on three-term incumbent member of parliament M. Saravanan, in the upcoming general election.

Its candidate will be Perak party chief Mutalib Uthman, who made the announcement in his Facebook today.

He said the seat was allocated to Muda after discussions with Pakatan Harapan (PH). PKR had been contesting in this seat in recent elections.

Muda is an ally of PH in the November 19 polls.

“For the record, the Tapah seat is a rural seat, which is a Barisan Nasional (BN) stronghold and its incumbent is Human Resources Minister Saravanan,” said Mutalib.

He said Muda’s decision to contest the seat is in line with its approach of taking on BN cabinet members in the other three seats.

Saravanan, who is also MIC deputy president, has held the Tapah seat since 2008. This constituency was created in 1984 and had been in the hands of BN/MIC since the 1986 general election.

In the last general election, Saravanan retained the seat with a slim 614-vote majority in a three-cornered fight.

So far, Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s Pejuang has named its candidate, Mior Nor Haidir Suhaimi, to contest in Tapah.

Perikatan Nasional is also expected to name a candidate from PAS for this seat.  

Last night, Muda announced that it will contest in three BN strongholds – Kepala Batas, Tanjong Karang and Tanjung Piai.

All three are rural seats where the incumbents held portfolios in the cabinet.

The party is also in talks with PH on contesting in the Sembrong seat in Johor, held by Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein.

Muda is also planning to contest in Sabah, with a decision to be made soon.

It was reported last week that Muda had asked for fewer than 15 parliamentary seats in the polls.

On October 12, PH chairman Anwar Ibrahim said the coalition would work with Muda in the elections.

However, he added that the PH presidential council decided that it would be in the form of an electoral pact, instead of accepting Muda as a component party, as that would require the approval of the Registrar of Societies. – October 30, 2022.