Pakatan Harapan president Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail does not really see a need for the coalition to submit names of prospective election candidates to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) for vetting, as it has its own vetting system.

She was responding to MACC chief commissioner Dzulkifli Ahmad’s invitation to political parties to do so.

“If need be (we will submit the list). But at the moment, I’m just saying, who is MACC?” she told reporters at the PKR headquarters today.

When told that it was normal practice for Barisan Nasional parties to submit the candidate list to the commission, Wan Azizah said that this was because BN “has a problem.”

“(That’s why) they have to go through (the vetting process). We have our own internal vetting. If need be, of course, we will send (the list to MACC).”

She then cited MACC’s “history” of purported selective prosecution against members of the opposition.

“So, we have to be a bit wary. Is this just a political ploy?” she asked.

Dzulkifli (photo) was quoted by Bernama as saying that although there was no law to compel parties to submit the list, vetting could be carried out to ensure that candidates were “clean” and not tainted by corruption and abuse of power.

He said BN parties were the only ones to have submitted names of leaders and would-be candidates to be vetted in the past, and that opposition parties had never done so.

Meanwhile, on PAS’ claim that Harapan de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim and Harapan chairperson Dr Mahathir Mohamad would rejoin Umno, Wan Azizah said: “It’s in the past.”

Wan Azizah also confirmed Selayang MP William Leong’s (photo) resignation from PKR’s political bureau.

“Yes, he has resigned,” she said.

Leong resigned from the party’s political bureau in protest against PKR’s decision to continue holding talks about possible cooperation with PAS, despite the split between the two parties earlier this year.