MIC treasurer-general S Vell Paari is surprised that Pakatan Harapan chairperson Dr Mahathir Mohamad is making an issue out of the Election Commission's redelineation exercise.

“Mahathir conveniently forgot and ignored the fact that in his 22 years as prime minister, there were three redelineation exercises conducted which were in 1984, 1994 and 2003.

“For him to now criticise this redelination exercise shows the hypocrisy of Mahathir (photo),” he added in a statement this afternoon.

Vell Paari called on the opposition to stop politicising this issue and to focus on serving the people in their respective constituencies.

“The redelineation exercise is a part of Malaysia's democracy system and process as per our constitution. The opposition shall not interfere in the roles and responsibility of the EC,” he added.

Vell Paari pointed out that the redelineation exercise is embedded in our constitution and there is nothing illegal about it.

“Article 113(2)(ii) of the Federal Constitution clearly specifies that: There shall be an interval of not less than eight years between the date of completion of one review, and the date of commencement of the next review, under this clause,” he said.

Since the last review was done in 2003, Vell Paari said it was time to review the election boundaries again.

Therefore, the MIC leader argued that the EC was only following the constitution in exercising its right.

“The redelineation exercise was done in the spirit of the constitution to ease voters to vote. The government has made it clear it did not interfere with the process done by the EC,” he added.

Vell Paari pointed out that even Umno had protested against the redelineation exercise.

“For example, Ampang Umno division chief Ismail Kijo had also opposed EC's plan to delineate two polling districts from the Ampang parliament to the Gombak parliament.

“Under Part II of the 13th Schedule of the Federal Constitution, the EC is required to hold inquiries to consider these objections following the mandated redelineation exercise. Thus the redelineation affects all parties not only the opposition,” he said.