Negeri Sembilan assembly dissolves Thursday

The Negeri Sembilan state legislative assembly will dissolve automatically this Thursday, March 28, according to the Election Commission (EC) today.

EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof said that the state government's mandate will end on Wednesday and will automatically dissolve the following day.

Abdul Aziz told Astro Awani that the terms of all state assemblymen will automatically end but the positions of the menteri besar, speaker and exco members will still continue in the form of a caretaker government.

"The speaker will write to the EC to officially inform us that the state assembly is dissolved," he said, adding that the latest date of the state elections must be held by May 27.

Meanwhile, state Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan also explained the confusion about the date of dissolution.

Mohamad said that the proceeding of the assembly will run for five years from the date of the first meeting, according Clause 56 (3) of the state constitution.

He said the day the house representatives took their oaths on March 27, 2008 was not the first day of of the assembly's proceeding but the following day on March 28, 2008.

"So at 12 midnight on March 27 2013, the assembly is exactly five years old and the house is dissolved on March 28 2013 and a caretaker government would be appointed.