Proposed fuel subsidies suspended, and 9 news from yesterday

KINI ROUNDUP | Here are key headlines you may have missed yesterday, in brief.

1. The targeted fuel subsidy scheme slated to be implemented from tomorrow has been suspended, indefinitely, to allow for more time to roll out the programme.

2. Anifah Aman’s two sons have been withdrawn from Sabah Umno’s list of potential candidates for the forthcoming Kimanis by-election.

3. The Election Reform Committee will propose replacing Malaysia’s first-past-the-post system with a proportional representation system, in the hope of partially addressing malapportionment.

4. Three police personnel claimed to have been beaten during interrogation by the MACC, to which MACC chief commissioner Latheefa Koya said the MACC officer involved had lodged a police report stating that the allegations were false. She pledged full cooperation to any investigation on the matter.

5. De facto Law Minister Liew Vui Keong said the government aims to introduce legislative changes to decriminalise suicide in the middle of 2020.

6. Universiti Malaysia Perlis (UniMAP) pledged to investigate complaints that the examination paper for its Ethnic Relations course contained a question that described the controversial Muslim preacher Zakir Naik as an “icon of the Islamic world”.

7. Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said DAP is disappointed with the differential treatment of the police to the Chinese Organisations Congress last Saturday, compared with that for the Malay Dignity Congress two months earlier. An on this, MCA president Wee Ka Siong teased Lim, asking whether he needed the home minister’s phone number.

8. Federal Territories Minister Khalid Abdul Samad said ministers’ salaries are already at an “okay” level, while Finance Minister Lim welcomed a proposal to slash ministers’ allowances.

9. PKR mouthpiece Suara Keadilan has ceased operations and its eight employees were promised a transfer to an online version of the party organ.

10. Ukrainian Ambassador to Malaysia Olexander Nechytaylo said court proceedings to establish criminal responsibility for the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 will begin in March next year, which he hopes would bring closure to the victims’ next-of-kin.