Azalina: Scrap quota system

(The Star) – Umno should scrap the quota system now and not decide on the matter after the general assembly and elections in March, said supreme council member Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said.

“Only cowards choose to contest under the quota system. Puteri Umno never practised the quota system even to this day and anybody can challenge for positions,” said Azalina, the former Puteri chief.

She noted that other opposition parties like the DAP, PKR and PAS never used the quota system.

“I feel saddened by this system which does not encourage democracy in contests,” Azalina, who is Tourism Minister, told a press conference after launching the Penang Zoom! Homestay Programme here yesterday.

She said that the supreme council meeting on Thursday discussed the quota system and the holding of elections without it.

She said that Umno should stop the rhetoric and “change for the better in order to remain relevant.”

Umno information chief Tan Sri Muhammad Muhammad Taib had said that the quota system would be looked into after the party elections in March.

The system was introduced after the bitter party elections in 1987 which caused a split in the party and Umno being banned the following year.

Many believed that the system and centralised voting had contributed to the rampant problem of money politics during party elections.