Is Waytha Moorthy’s civil suit to disqualify PMX’s premiership a sheer publicity stunt?

Is Waytha Moorthy’s civil suit to disqualify PMX’s premiership a sheer publicity stunt?

WHEN starved of the oxygen of publicity, one tactic is to create some legal drama to capture the public’s attention. The higher the defendant’s profile, the better.


Could this be the thinking behind the Hindu Rights Action Force (HINDRAF)/Malaysian Advancement Party founder P. Waytha Moorthy’s civil suit that seeks to disqualify the premiership of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim?


This is on grounds that the royal pardon granted to the PKR president in 2018 did not state that he was exempt from the five-year disqualification period for contesting an election after being released from prison.

For context, the former minister in Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s cabinet from 2018 to 2020 has wanted the High Court to declare PMX’s election as Tambun MP on Nov 19, 2022 and his appointment as Prime Minister five days later null and void.

On X, governance advocate ksampoh@MyOwn Inc (@Ksampoh) gave a detailed explanation as to why Waytha’s suit was doomed to fail, citing similar suits against disgraced former premiers Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Tun Dr Mahathir which were previously thrown out by the court.

Claiming that it was all just “political theatre”, the self-described true patriot confidently predicts that the suit will not succeed as “the Federal Constitution, statutory time limits and past court decisions all make it clear that your case won’t survive the first procedural hurdle”.

Commenters on the post were no less scathing with a few seeing right though the charade. One contended that the rakyat are tired of all the smokescreen acts “by the same line-up of lawyers” that are mere diversionary tactics.



It was a calculated move to ride on the momentum of the Turun Anwar rally, claimed one commenter. Knowing full well that the suit is not valid, it was argued that the former unity minister during Dr Mahathir’s second premiership stint was merely trying “to score some points in the court of public opinion”.



As a person with a legal background, one commentator accused Waytha of manipulating the judicial system to spin conspiracy theories by claiming that the “Madani (administration) controls the judiciary”. He would not be surprised if many citizens would believe Waytha.



A few condemned this being a waste of court time and resources. One commenter suggested that the suit be dismissed and the 59-year-old politician be left to shoulder all the cost of this frivolous action.



It was also claimed this was a part of a concerted attack on PMX by opposition groups to weaken his grip on power.

One commenter highlighted that this suit was only filed AFTER the lawyer had met with Bersatu representatives, an insinuation that this was calculated political manoeuvring.



More pertinently, the timing of the suit was questioned. Why not when PMX won in the Port Dickson by-election in 2018? Such gaps in reasoning caused one commenter to denounce “this HINDRAF man is just good for nothing”.



Such spurious and superfluous suits to create mere political theatre are an abuse of the legal process.

As pointed out by one commenter, Malaysians are “tired” of the constant wayang kulit (theatrics) in the jostle for power and influence. One commenter simply urged such individuals to stop wasting the rakyat’s time. – Aug 15, 2025