PM: We will not recognise polls in Sabah if corruption involved

The Pakatan Harapan federal government will not recognise the election in Sabah if there was corruption involved, said Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

“There is evidence that there were some manipulation (in the election), for example in Sabah.

“Warisan won 35 seats but the Election Commission kept recounting to reduce Warisan to 29 seats.

“Now they have a problem because they cannot form a government and there is an intention to get people to cross over using money (in Sabah),” he said during a press conference in Kuala Lumpur today.

Mahathir said it is fine for elected representatives to switch sides because of principles, but if done in return for a financial reward, then this is corruption.

To this he said investigations will be carried out to determine if any bribery was involved in getting people to crossover in Sabah.

“We do not recognise this as a proper change of government,” he added.

Both BN and Warisan had won 29 state seats each in Sabah, with Star winning two.

However, Star president Jeffrey Kitingan yesterday announced that he would form an alliance with BN, allowing the coalition to form the state government with a simple majority.

Mahathir further claimed the MACC, too, has ignored rampant corruption during the election.

“The last two days (before the election), for example, there were no speeches made, only money being thrown.

“There are a lot of grey areas where people used money to buy support. That can also be considered corruption,” he said, adding that would also be investigated.

He then sought to assure that he and the new administration was not seeking revenge, but rather, they were merely following the rule of law.

“When we find evidence that a person won through corruption, we may request that the election (results for those seats) be invalidated,” he said. -Mkini