The Umno logo is pictured at Menara Dato’ Onn in Kuala Lumpur December 7, 2020. — Picture by Hari Anggara
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 8 — The Registrar of Societies’ (RoS) decision to invalidate Umno’s postponement of its elections that were initially due June 30 will not cause the country’s biggest political party to be deregistered.
Chinese vernacular paper Sin Chew Daily today reported RoS director-general Jasri Kasim saying the invalidation, as announced last Friday, would not result in the cancellation of Umno’s registration.
“The department’s announcement that Umno’s decision to postpone party elections being invalid, will not cause Umno’s registration to be revoked,” he was quoted saying.
Jasri was responding to lawyer Mohamed Haniff Khatri Abdulla, who told Malay Mail last week that the next steps that RoS could take would include suspending or even deregistering Umno.
As for when Umno would have to hold its party elections, Jasri was reported saying by Sin Chew Daily that the party would have to apply to postpone party elections and propose a new date to RoS, or that the party polls would have to be held before December 31 this year.
Umno last had its election on June 30, 2018, and the three-year term of its party president and other office-bearers would have ended on June 30 this year and required a new party election by then.
The Malay nationalist party postponed its party elections by 18 months from June 30, but the validity of this decision is now in dispute.
Last Friday, RoS said Umno’s decision to postpone party polls was invalid. It cited the party’s supreme council meeting minutes on July 7 that noted the postponement decision was made when the supreme council’s term had already expired.
But Umno secretary-general Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan countered this assertion on Twitter with a chronology of events, including his June 24 letter to notify the RoS of the postponement decision. He also shared a July 19 letter from the RoS that it had no objection towards this postponement decision.
Sin Chew Daily quoted Jasri as saying that however the full version of the July 19 letter included the RoS saying it had no objection as this postponement decision complies with Umno’s party constitution’s Article 10.16, but the same RoS letter had also said the Umno secretary-general had to produce detailed information to enable further verification.
Jasri said the same RoS letter on July 19 had also stated that RoS could under the Societies Act 1966 at any time direct a society to produce any information.
Among other things, Ahmad’s chronology had stated that he had as Umno secretary-general on July 30 wrote to the RoS director-general about the July 7 Umno supreme council meeting minutes that legitimised an earlier June 18 circular resolution among Umno supreme council members to postpone the party polls.
Ahmad is expected to write a reply letter to the RoS on Monday.