Apex court allows MIC man's appeal for full trial of Segamat election petition

The Federal Court today allowed Barisan Nasional (BN) candidate M Ramasamy's appeal to send back his Segamat election petition to the Election Court for a full hearing.

A three-member bench comprising justices Zabariah Mohd Yusof, Hasnah Mohammed Hashim, and Mary Lim Thiam Suan ordered the petition to be heard before another judge.

The court set aside this April 3 decision of the Election Court, which struck out Ramasamy's election petition after accepting a preliminary objection raised by respondents.

The respondents named in the petition are Segamat MP R Yuneswaran, the returning officer, and the Election Commission (EC).

In the court's decision, justice Zabariah remitted the petition back to the Election Court to hear on issues pertaining to whether the campaign materials had violated the election laws and on bribery allegations.

The Federal Court judge (justice Zabariah) then fixed Aug 24 for mention of the case at the Election Court.

Yuneswaran, a Pakatan Harapan candidate, won the seat with a majority of 5,669 votes in the 15th general election held last year and was declared the elected member of parliament for the constituency.

He defeated Ramasamy, Perikatan Nasional's P Poobalan and Pejuang's Syed Hairoul Faizey. Ramasamy, who is MIC treasurer stood as a candidate BN for that parliamentary constituency.

Ramasamy subsequently filed the election petition, seeking, among others, a declaration that the parliamentary election for the Segamat constituency was void and a declaration that Yuneswaran was not duly elected as a member of parliament.

The Election Court judge Mohd Radzi Abdul Hamid had dismissed Ramasamy’s election petition after accepting the preliminary objection raised by the respondents, among others, that Ramasamy failed to comply with Rule 15(4) of the Election Petition Rules 1954, pertaining to the particulars of his (Ramasamy's) affidavit of service and his failure to comply with the election petition rules regarding the facts pleaded in his petition which were incapable of sustaining the declarations sought.

Ramasamy was represented by lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, while lawyer Lau Yi Leong represented Yuneswaran, and senior federal counsel Suzana Atan appeared for the returning officer and the EC.