PMTG PAUH PKR strategic director Sim Tze Tzin denied that the party would be reimbursing bus tickets for outstation voters to come back to vote.

“It is not our practise and we will strictly abide by election laws,” said Sim, who is Bayan Baru MP.

Sim said this was agreed by state PKR chief Mansor Othman and the party’s Permatang Pauh election director Saifuddin Nasution.

Earlier Rashid Hasnor, who is Deputy Chief Minister I, said the reimbursement can be collected from PKR’s operations centre in Permatang Pauh.

He said the decision to do this was made at the party’s election machinery meeting.

“This is to encourage everyone to return to vote,” Rashid told Malaysiakini .

Asked if this was a form of vote-buying and violates the Election Law which prohibits such acts before, during and after polls, Rashid ( left ) said, “No”.

Pro-BN social media site has condemned the act as ‘vote-buying’ and ‘insulting’ to the 70,000 odd voters in the parliamentary seat.

“We are doing this for the public. We don’t care which party you vote for. You can be a BN or Pakatan supporter, you can claim the money if you produce a ticket,” he said.

“We are not forcing people to claim their money or vote for PKR, but this is our effort to encourage everyone to exercise their voting rights,” he added.

“By the way, not everyone will come to reimburse their tickets. We leave it to them,” he stressed.

Rashid said a fund-raising dinner will be organised tomorrow to raise funds for this matter.

Since the polls campaign started on April 25, Pakatan has gone on an intense campaign to appeal to voters to return to vote.

Pakatan claims that Permatang Pauh has about 6,000 outstation voters.

This is because the polling day, May 7, is a working day outside Penang.

In Penang, Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng has declared Thursday a holiday, although BN leaders say this is unnecessary.

PKR’s candidate Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail is contesting against Umno’s Suhaimi Sabudin, PRM’s Azman Shah Othman and Salleh Isahak, an Independent.