Democracy undermined
Forces are at work to subvert the voters’ choice in the last general election while others are playing up emotive issues of race and religion for political ends, warns P Ramakrishnan.
Pakatan doesn’t need an enemy to destroy it. It can self-destruct quite easily – thanks to certain renegades within coalition partner Parti Keadilan Rakyat!
The undercurrent that has been simmering for some time has finally surfaced with the Bayan Baru MP, Datuk Zahrain Mohamed Hashim, lashing out at the Penang Chief Minister publicly, accusing him of being “dictatorial, chauvinistic and communist-minded”.
From the public’s perspective, there are several MPs in PKR who have taken public positions contrary to the stated aims of the party thus undermining its credibility as a viable component of the Pakatan Rakyat.
Word has it that some of them are deliberately daring the party to take action against them so that they can justify their joining the Barisan Nasional. In fact, they are provoking the party to discipline them – which would make it easier for them to leave the party.
There is talk that Umno is trying to entice them to cross over. Overtures are believed to have been made to encourage this but it has not been revealed what the price would be. To be sure, it must be hefty!
Hidden objectives
Having successfully subverted the Pakatan government in Perak, the BN – especially Umno – is now hard at work to achieve two other objectives.
Objective number one is to topple the Pakatan Selangor state government and take over the richest state. All it takes is for seven state assembly members to be bought over and Umno will have the Selangor state government in its pocket!
Objective number two is for the BN to regain its traditional two-third-majority in parliament. Again, all it takes is for nine MPs to jump ship.
These objectives are achievable if the greed of certain elected reps can be fed with with millions of ringgit to entice them to switch parties. This is how they will turn certain people into traitors and force them to commit treachery.
Let’s remember that the treachery when it is committed is not against the political party they desert but in fact it against the Malaysian voters and against democracy.
If ever elected representatives turn into renegades and turncoats, through enticement and bribery, we must not only punish these traitors in the next round of elections but we must severely punish the party that encourages such treachery.
When we give a simple majority to the Opposition, it is possible for our will to be subverted through corruption, as has happened in Perak. It is easy to buy a few representatives. But when we give the Opposition a bigger majority, it will be very difficult to frustrate the peoples’ mandate.
Let’s do a better job when the 13th General Election takes place. Let’s not only give the Opposition a bigger majority; it would be even better to reverse the roles and give the Opposition a chance to rule Malaysia.
This was what I wrote on 1 February 2010 on Aliran’s ‘Thinking Allowed Online’. The events unfolding since then confirm that this possibility is on course. Forces are hard at work to realise this.
It seems that certain PKR elected MPs, representatives and members who have been very vocal and critical of their party were only playing for time to make their move at the right time. What would be the right time, you may wonder. Well, as long as Anwar is mobile and able to travel around the country, that would be the wrong time to make a move. He would have turned the turncoats into villains and vile characters who deserve to be roundly condemned. He would have turned the tide against them.
Is that the reason Anwar’s Sodomy II was scheduled to take place around at this time – so that he would be tied down in court proceedings to do any effective damage control? Apparently, it seems so! But of course, you would be told that this is a mere coincidence! You would be assured that the Barisan Nasional doesn’t interfere with the judiciary and that the law was only taking its course.
Whatever the explanation, the ground work had thus been laid, as it were, to allow for betrayals and treachery to run riot.
