Malaysia's opposition calls for new elections

Malaysia's opposition calls for new elections

Associated Press, Kuala Lumpur

Malaysia's opposition alleged fraud and demanded new elections on Wednesday, after a wholesale rout by Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's coalition that confronts them with near-extinction in Parliament and state governments.

Meanwhile, Abdullah faced expectations to fulfill campaign promises to fight corruption and could replace one-third of his Cabinet with a lineup decided as early as on Saturday, the pro- government New Straits Times newspaper reported. Some ministries may be restructured.

Voters dealt the opposition, led by the fundamentalist Pan- Malaysian Islamic Party, a stunning blow in Sunday's general elections by delivering Abdullah's secular National Front coalition 90 percent of the seats in the 219-member Parliament, based on 65 percent of the popular vote.

The Islamic party, known as PAS, saw its parliamentary bloc collapse from 27 to seven, while the People's Justice Party was nearly obliterated, losing four seats and keeping only the one held by leader Azizah Ismail, wife of jailed former deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim.

"If Abdullah doesn't take action, people will compare this result with elections held during Saddam's rule in Iraq," said Justice Party youth chief Ezam Mohamad Noor.

PAS and the Justice Party accuse the nominally independent Election Commission and the government of conspiring to fix the results with bribery, stacking election rolls with phantom voters and other irregularities.

Both parties vowed to amass evidence and petition the High Court to strike down the results and hold new elections.

Any legal challenge is highly unlikely to succeed. Malaysia's courts lost much independence under the 22-year rule of Mahathir Mohamad. Judges have regained some of their authority in recent years, but important decisions rarely go against the government.

"We have unanimously decided to reject the entire results of the general elections," said PAS leader Abdul Hadi Awang after a five-hour meeting of the Central Committee. "The elections were full of cheating and fraud. We are ready to have elections again."

Hadi lost his parliamentary seat as well as the office of chief minister of Terengganu, an oil-rich state that swung back to Abdullah's coalition.

The Islamic party denied that its proposals for a hard-line religious state - with penalties such as amputating thieves' hands - were a factor in its defeat. The prospect terrifies the large, non-Muslim Chinese and Indian majorities, though PAS has said they'd be spared.

"There's no reason we must change just because we didn't get the votes," said Nasaruddin Isa, the PAS secretary-general. "We are not a pragmatic party, as far as our principles are concerned."

But elsewhere, the opposition was divided. Lim Kit Siang, veteran leader of the secular Democratic Action Party, was returned to Parliament after a five-year hiatus, helping boost his group's total seats from 10 to 12. His party broke a tactical alliance with PAS two years ago after losing support because of the Islamic state project.