Selangor PAS insulting sultan with frozen budget complaints, says Azmin

Attempts by PAS to drag the Selangor palace into its allocation tussle with the state government is an insult to the royal institution, Selangor Menteri Besar Mohamed Azmin Ali said today.

Speaking to reporters after attending the Karnival Himpunan Rakyat at Stadium Malawati, Shah Alam, Azmin said there was no reason to involve the palace in an administrative issue.

"Why do we need to involve the palace? This is an administrative issue," he said when asked for comments on Selangor PAS commissioner Sallehen Mukhyi's letter to Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah.

Sallehen’s letter, which was sent on March 12, addressed the issue of the party's state assemblypersons being allegedly denied their constituency allocations for two months.

Asked whether he would follow up with the sultan on the issue, Azmin insisted that there was no need for him to do so.

"I have told them (PAS), go and see the district officers. Not the sultan.

"This is an insult to the palace," said the PKR deputy president.

Commenting further, Azmin said PAS representatives should have followed the proper procedure to claim their constituency allocations which had been approved under the state's budget for this year.

He also pointed out that Selangor is the only state to provide allocations for its opposition state assemblypersons, unlike BN at federal and state levels.

"If I can give allocations to Umno, it can't be that I won't give to PAS," he added.

Sallehen had previously said that all Selangor PAS state representatives would not be formally appealing to Azmin for their allocations to be reinstated, as it was not the practice to do so.

As of the end of last month, he also revealed that nine Selangor PAS state assemblypersons have forked out close to RM700,000 of their own money for various programmes since January after being allegedly denied allocations by the state government. -Mkini