Pakatan Harapan will be taking the Registrar of Societies to court for failing to respond to their application to be registered as an official coalition.

Harapan chairperson Dr Mahathir Mohamad said the legal action, to be filed by the end of this week, was to compel the ROS to respond to the coalition on the grounds that failure to do so has affected their preparations for the 14th general election.

"There has been no response from the ROS. Despite engaging with them we have not received any reply.

"We cannot say that they have rejected (our application) because they haven't done it.

"But at the same time we can't do anything because we are not registered," he told a press conference at the Bersatu headquarters in Petaling Jaya this afternoon.

He further claimed that ROS’ silence could be seen as helping BN win the 14th general election.

"It is not right for a government agency to be one-sided in carrying out its responsibilities," he said.

Harapan chief secretary Saifuddin Abdullah (photo) said earlier this month that the coalition had submitted an official letter to the ROS, which was address to its director-general Suriyati Ibrahim.

In the letter, Saifuddin cited a Nov 20 meeting with Suriyati, during which Harapan was told that its application could not be processed because the ROS was still awaiting a report from the Bersatu annual general meeting and the party's annual returns, as well as DAP's Central Executive Committee (CEC) re-election report.

Saifuddin also said that since the ROS has recognised DAP's re-election, it is time the registrar recognised that Bersatu was a registered body.

Bersatu has to date hit a brick wall in seeking to be registered, with Mahathir previously complaining of concerted efforts of unnamed quarters to prevent it from happening.