MELAKA: Maverick Datuk Norhizam Hassan Baktee (pic) says he will defend his Pengkalan Batu seat as a Parti Keadilan Rakyat candidate, claiming the party’s top leadership had accepted him.

       “PKR feels I am priceless,” he claimed, adding he was sure most of his constituents would support him.

       Norhizam added that he was pledged to be fielded as a candidate in Pengkalan Batu.

       “Anyway, it’s up to the discretion of the leadership should they want me to contest in another constituency,” he said here yesterday.

       Norhizman said he would also ask DAP supporters in his constituency to support him if he is chosen as the Pengkalan Batu candidate.

       He added he also has no plans to rejoin DAP after leaving the Barisan Nasional/Pakatan Nasional-led state government on Oct 4.

       Norhizam was the Melaka DAP deputy chairman when he defected to the Barisan Nasional/Perikatan Nasional-led state government in March last year.

       He then left the ruling state government along with three other assemblymen last month, leading to the dissolution of the state assembly and a state election being set for Nov 20.

       The three assemblymen – Datuk Seri Idris Haron and Nor Azman Hassan, both Umno defectors and former Parti Bersatu Pribumi Noor Effandi Ahmad – were reportedly vying to contest in the Melaka election as Pakatan candidates.

       Meanwhile, DAP’s Kota Laksamana representative Low Chee Leong said he would start a protest if Melaka Pakatan Harapan fields Norhizam as a candidate in the state election.

       “I am happy that DAP had openly rejected Norhizam from joining the party but our partners in Pakatan may field him as a candidate.

       “It will not be right for Pakatan to accept those who had betrayed the coalition.

       “I don’t understand why Pakatan leaders in the state are still courting him as though we don’t have any other candidates,” he said.

       Melaka Harapan chief Adly Zahari said any decision on letting the quartet contest under the coalition’s banner would be made by the presidential council.

       Norhizam, when contacted, asked Low to mind his own business.

       “Even Melaka DAP chairman Datuk Tey Kok Kiew had never commented negatively about me.

       “Low is not the state Pakatan or DAP chief to discourage my entry into the coalition,” he said.