The Hon. Faiszer Musthapha, PC

¶ 01 Hon. Deputy Speaker, as a former Minister of Provincial Councils and Local Government, I welcome the objective of this Bill: cancel the 2023 nominations and call fresh nominations, as it is neither practical nor fair to conduct a 2025 poll on 2023 nominations, especially with the 2024 Register in force.

¶ 02 There is, however, the interface with the Supreme Court Judgment compelling the holding of the election; thus, this Bill was correctly determined to require a special majority.

¶ 03 Please also consider the Bill’s spirit: it grants three months from certification to proceed. In 2017, as Minister, I brought the Amendment that abolished the corrupt preferential vote practice and introduced enhanced female representation — 25% — enabling many women to serve. Today, the Government also benefits from that framework; its nominations, too, will be cancelled under this Bill.

¶ 04 Yet there are deficiencies to rectify before the poll. The law requires at least 10% women on the ward nomination paper and 50% on the PR list; in practice, a majority of women members ended up from the Opposition. I urge the Government to amend the Act to improve women’s effective entry, including revisiting the 10% threshold on nomination papers. The Bill already allows up to 30 days for nominations, and three months overall, so such corrective amendments can be made without delaying the poll.

¶ 05 Further, the expansion to roughly 8,000 local members has imposed a cost on the Treasury. There should be a mechanism to rationalize that number. I appeal to the Hon. Minister to bring these amendments within the three-month window provided.