Official: Kayveas to contest in Cameron Highlands
Disputed MyPPP president M Kayveas has officially announced he will contest in the Cameron Highlands by-election.
“This is a unique situation. There are 222 parliamentary seats and out of those, Cameron Highlands is the only one to have a by-election, (and) it is a seat we have been working for and asking for.
"So we thought we cannot pass up this opportunity,” Kayveas said in a press conference outside the party headquarters today.
Disputed MyPPP president M Kayveas has officially announced he will contest in the Cameron Highlands by-election.
“This is a unique situation. There are 222 parliamentary seats and out of those, Cameron Highlands is the only one to have a by-election, (and) it is a seat we have been working for and asking for.
"So we thought we cannot pass up this opportunity,” Kayveas said in a press conference outside the party headquarters today.
The MyPPP supreme council met this afternoon to decide if it would contest the parliamentary seat.
Kayveas, who said his candidacy has the full support of the council, had previously lobbied hard to contest the seat in the 14th general election.
However, BN handed the candidacy of the traditional MIC seat to C Sivaraajh, who went on to win.
The Cameron Highlands by-election was triggered when the Election Court declared the seat vacant after determining that vote-buying had led to Sivarraajh's victory.
Kayveas, who called himself an “underdog” in the race, said he has at least a 50-50 chance of winning.
He added that some of the issues he plans to highlight during his campaign include labour, environment, traffic, housing, Orang Asli and land titles.
Though he admitted that MyPPP does not have much funds for the campaign, he said relying on funds in elections now is not a wise move, considering the reason this by-election was triggered in the first place.
Kayveas said this by-election would depend more on manpower and he is convinced he has “sincere” members to help his campaign.
However, he added, the party is open to donations.
Earlier, Malaysiakini reported that Kayveas believes BN will not field an MIC candidate if he runs for the seat.
He claimed that BN knows he is more popular with the Indians in the constituency than MIC.
Malaysiakini has contacted MIC president SA Vigneswaran for his response but he declined to comment on this claim.
Regarding his dispute over the MyPPP presidency with Maglin Dennis D’Cruz, Kayveas insisted the Registrar of Societies (RoS) has recognised him as the legitimate party president.
“I have been called by the registrar who said ‘you are the president, please settle with D’Cruz’.
“I called D’Cruz, we had three meetings and he doesn’t want to settle. That is up to him,” he said.
He insisted that the party constitution states that the president can only be removed via an annual general meeting or an extraordinary general meeting.
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