KUALA LUMPUR: Umno's Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah (BN-Gua Musang) is now sitting in the independent bloc in Dewan Rakyat after making a formal request on Monday.
This was confirmed by Dewan Rakyat Deputy Speaker Datuk Mohd Rashid Hasnon who said that Speaker Datuk Azhar Azizan Harun had made the necessary arrangements after receiving the request from Tengku Razaleigh.
"We only received one request, from the Gua Musang MP, to sit in the independent bloc and his new seat has been set by the Speaker to be at the back, which is the independent bloc," he told reporters in the parliament building today.
On Monday, it was reported that Tengku Razaleigh had sent a letter to Azhar to inform the latter that he wished to change his seat in the Dewan Rakyat to a place "closer to the independent bloc".
This was confirmed by Azhar who said that he had received the notification and had instructed the Dewan Rakyat secretary to make the necessary arrangements for Tengku Razaleigh.
Apart from Tengku Razaleigh, Rashid said the House had not received any new requests from other MPs to switch to a new bloc, whether from the government or the opposition side.
Recently it was reported that four Barisan Nasional MPs had also made a similar request but claimed that their requests were rejected by Azhar.
The four BN MPs were Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (Bagan Datuk), Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan (Pontian), Datuk Ahmad Nazlan Idris (Jerantut) and Datuk Ahmad Jazlan Yaakub (Machang).
In response to the allegation, Azhar described the news report as a lie and slander, adding that he did not receive any request from these four BN MPs.