Good morning. Here's what you need to know today.
Key Highlights
To dissolve or not to dissolve?
‘Rakyat vs rasuah’ - battling Zahid
United against BN - electoral pact
To dissolve or not to dissolve?
Former Penang chief minister Lim Guan Eng and DAP secretary-general Anthony Loke have differing views on whether the northern state should have simultaneous polls with the general election.
Lim claimed the people of Penang wanted the legislature to be dissolved. He also wished to see Umno-BN dealt a double blow at the federal and state levels.
However, Loke prefers to stick with Pakatan Harapan’s current stand of not dissolving state legislative assemblies under their control until the monsoon season has passed.
Some 160km from Penang’s capital of George Town, Umno’s Perak Menteri Besar Saarani Mohamad’s bid to dissolve the state assembly appears to have hit a royal snag.
Instead of giving his consent, Perak ruler Sultan Nazrin Shah said he wanted to deliberate on the matter before making a decision.
On the other hand, PAS remained steadfast in its decision not to dissolve the state assemblies of Terengganu, Kelantan and Kedah.
HIGHLIGHTS
 | |
 | |
 |
‘Rakyat vs rasuah’ - battling Zahid
The eldest son of the late former deputy prime minister Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman is hoping to convince the voters in Bagan Datuk, Perak, to vote against the incumbent - Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
Tawfik Ismail, 71, pledged to battle the Umno president even if the latter moved from his stronghold to contest another seat.
"I will call on all Malaysians who hate corruption to see my fight as their fight," he said.
Tawfik explained that it was important for him to set his sights on the “leader” as the others were nothing more than “tadpoles”.
The former Sungai Benut MP will be running as an independent candidate under the Gerak Independent (GI) platform.
HIGHLIGHTS
 | |
 | |
 |
United against BN - electoral pact
Pakatan Harapan will cooperate with Muda in the next general election. This will be in the form of an electoral pact.
Muda had initially applied to join Harapan but the coalition’s leader Anwar Ibrahim said this would lead to problems in terms of obtaining the Registrar of Societies’ approval at this juncture.
Meanwhile, Harapan’s presidential council has sent a draft of the agreement containing the pact’s requirements to Muda as well as PSM.
However, the draft agreement does not stipulate seat allocations.
HIGHLIGHTS
 | |
 | |
 |
Views that matter
 | By R Nadeswaran |
 | By P Gunasegaram |
 | By S Thayaparan |
Other news that matter
The government will reduce toll charges for six highways in the Klang Valley within the next three months.
Announcing the new rates ahead of the 15th general election, caretaker Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said the cabinet decided, more than four months ago, that the charge reductions will be done in two phases.
The Special Task Force’s report on former attorney-general Tommy Thomas' book will be declassified.
Following the findings of the task force, Putrajaya instructed the police and MACC to probe Thomas for sedition, abuse of power and allegedly violating the Official Secrets Act.
Another task force looking into the Batu Puteh issue said that former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad could have been negligent on the matter.
HIGHLIGHTS
 | |
 | |
 |