KOTA KINABALU: The Election Court here has set Nov 7 for decision of a petition filed by Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) candidate Datuk Maijol Mahap to nullify the 13th general election result for the Kota Marudu parliamentary seat.
Judge Datuk Yew Jen Kee set the date after hearing the testimony by witnesses on the ninth day of hearing yesterday.
He also ordered both parties to file their submissions to the court by Oct 4.
Earlier, Returning Officer (RO) for the Kota Marudu parliamentary seat, Luvita Koisun, the last witness to testify, said she did not give instruction to the Ketua Tempat Mengundi (KTM) or polling station head to not give Form 14 to the PKR polling agent.
Luvita, 55, who had served as the RO for the second time in the last general election, said she also did not receive any complaints from the petitioner’s polling agent on the vote counting and tally.
She said there were 50 polling centres for the Kota Marudu parliamentary seat, including 20 in Matunggong and 20 in Tandek and that she received all the Form 14 that were sent by the KTMs at the respective centres.
She said that in compliance with the Election Regulations, the KTM would give the certified copies of the Form 14 to all the polling agents after the completion of the vote counting process whether or not they requested for the form.
In the petition, Mahap named Ongkili as the first respondent and RO Lovita Koisun and the Election Commission (EC) as the second and third respondents, respectively.
On Aug 13, Yew had ruled that allegations of corruption against Ongkili pertaining to the contest be dropped from the petition but maintained Ongkili as the first respondent by virtue of him being the winner.
In his petition, Mahap had claimed that copies of Form 14 were not given to PKR’s polling agents.
Ongkili won with a majority of 842 votes after garnering 15,168 votes in a four-cornered fight. Mahap obtained 14,326 votes, Star candidate Majamis Timbong (2,228 votes) while Yuntau alias Kuntau Kolod (SAPP) only managed 444 votes. A total of 911 votes were rejected. — Bernama