For Zaid, winning in PKR polls is a step towards Putrajaya
By Clara Chooi, The Malaysian Insider
PETALING JAYA, Sept 17 – Datuk Zaid Ibrahim will be walking into the PKR polls this week with his sights set on Putrajaya, and not at the deputy presidency post he is contesting.
To the 59-year-old former Umno man, the main goal is not to win a more powerful party post, but to capture the country from the ruling Barisan Nasional government.
Speaking to The Malaysian Insider in a recent interview near his home at Tropicana Golf and Country Resort here, Zaid explained that winning the PKR deputy presidency was merely a step towards the opportunity to help in the process of preparing Pakatan Rakyat’s future in the country.
To the veteran politician, the fledgling PR coalition still lacked cohesiveness.
“We are too fractured. We must have a concrete plan. We must be able to tell the people of the country – What will we do to Malaysia when we come to power?
“I do not care about who becomes the Prime Minister because if it is just more of the same, then what difference does it make? I am interested in policy transformation on a grand scale, not about who is most powerful in the party,” he said.
As such, Zaid pointed out that he was not at all interested in who is in whose camp and all the petty infighting within the party, ahead of the looming party elections.
“I do not care. I want to focus on issues. Issues like what we stand for… our stand on issues of various fields, whether they are about economic policies, educational, race relations.
“If you look at PR today, we can strengthen each other by articulating policies that are clear. I want to focus on that… it is key to convincing the people that we are a serious opposition and a viable alternative government,” he said.
Zaid said that although PR had taken huge leaps forward by coming up with its common policy platform last year, it needed better follow-up actions.
“I was an architect of that platform but I believe we can do better and I would like to develop that further. So that is why I think my role in PKR can help to remove some of the ambiguities.
“For example, there are so many policy issues that we have yet to resolve. Like when DAP said they wanted to give RM1,000 to senior citizens… When (DAP’s) Tony Pua spoke about the housing discounts.
“These became issues but they were not yet discussed among all PR parties,” he said.
Zaid noted that the fact that the issues were only being raised by individual parties within the PR and not by the coalition as a single entity, proved that the opposition still had a long way to go.
“These things are just being bandied about in that fashion and this suggests a lack of cohesiveness.
“To me, it is key to be able to answer all these questions and this is what I want to contribute.
“What do we want to do with Felda, with Felcra, with the issue of race relations, on oil royalty? What is our stand on these issues?” he said.
He expressed disappointment at the common practice of many PR leaders to immediately point their fingers at the BN whenever administrative matters were mishandled.
“It is one thing to blame BN, Umno or Najib for their mismanagement… but then you too have to come up with something, tell the people that this is what PR wants to do and why it is the better way,” he said.
He complained that this was the kind of leadership that PKR currently lacked.
“And as the leader of the opposition, PKR needs to take the lead in this. We need to move forward and mobilise our partners in PR to draft out these common policies.
“We may not be able to do everything now but at least when the time comes, we can work from there,” he said.
When asked if this meant that he felt the PR would not know how to run the country if it were voted into government in the next general election, Zaid smiled and said it was hard to tell.
“I am not a soothsayer so I do not know what the future holds for us… however, stranger things have happened in politics. PR had nothing in 2008… and then suddenly, here we are, so another miracle could happen.
