KOTA KINABALU: The appeal over the Election Court's decision on Kimanis parliamentary seat is expected to be heard within 45 days after it is filed at the Federal Court.
The counsel of Datuk Seri Anifah Aman, Tengku Fuad Ahmad said the legal team would file their appeal tomorrow to challenge the court's decision to nullify the result of Kimanis in the 14th General Election (GE14).
The Election Court on Aug 16 had declared the four-term federal lawmaker’s win in GE14 as being null and void, which in turn made the seat vacant.
Fuad added that upon filing their appeal, the apex court is likely to hear the appeal within 30 to 45 days.
“Under the law, an appeal must be heard within six months from the date of filing,” he told the New Straits Times.
Last week, Anifah’s team had put on hold their appeal to see whether the Election Commission (EC) would also appeal to the apex Court.
The EC in a statement today said that it would not appeal the Election Court decision.
It chairman Azhar Azizan Harun, said the commission takes cognizance and accepts the Election Court’s verdict and as such would not appeal against it.
"However, if Anifah who retained the Parliament seat makes an appeal and is named as a respondent, the EC would attend and participate in the proceedings to the extent it is necessary," he said.
Fuad meanwhile said it was extraordinary that the EC was not standing by their own officers.
“The EC should appeal because based on the Election Court’s findings, the returning officer and other election officers are now exposed to potential liability under the Election Offences Act.
"I am of the regard, that the EC had let down its own people,” he said.
On Aug 16, Election Court Judge Lee Heng Cheong made the ruling after the court found irregularities with regards to the ballot boxes, which had elements of tampering.
In addition, he said the presence of additional voting papers could also have violated election laws and in turn affected the election outcome.
In SK Mandahan and Bambangan polling centres, Lee ruled that failure of the returning officer to provide Form 13 which was empty means that there was no document to verify how many ballot papers were issued.
The election petition was filed by Parti Warisan Sabah’s Datuk Karim Bujang, the Sabah based party’s candidate in the May 9 polls, to challenge the outcome of the polls.
Karim filed the petition on June 18 last year at the High Court and named Anifah as the first respondent and the EC as the second respondent.
In the polls, Anifah won the Kimanis parliamentary constituency with a razor thin 156-vote majority.
In the three-cornered fight, Anifah secured 11,942 votes against Karim who garnered 11,786 votes and Parti Harapan’s Jaafar Ismail, who received 1,300 votes.