Alang Bendahara, New Straits Times
Insiders said that Zaid had first spoken out against Anwar a year ago when he complained about Anwar’s intervention in the Sabah PKR episode.
“Zaid was of the opinion that the problem in Sabah PKR should be resolved by the state members. Yet Anwar wanted a hand in it,” said the party member.
The Sabah problem was sparked by the rivalry between two PKR leaders — vice-president Datuk Dr Jeffrey Kitingan and Ansari Abdullah — each of whom has his own line-up of loyal soldiers in the form of divisional leaders.
In the middle of last year, Ansari was favoured by the party leadership to take the lead in Sabah, a move opposed by those aligned to Kitingan.
All signs pointed to a possible attempt to remove Kitingan, but whether or not the move came with the blessings of the PKR leadership, remains uncertain.
The intended solution to the fight, which was the appointment of PKR vice-president and Gombak member of parliament Mohamed Azmin Ali to the post, met with strong opposition from the state PKR leaders.
Finally, to appease state leaders, party president Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail appointed Ahmad Thamrin from Sandakan as the state leader.
This didn’t appear to work as well because Kitingan soon threatened to sever all ties with PKR by resigning from his state party posts in October last year.
The reason given was that the people of Sabah remained marginalised by leaders in Kuala Lumpur.
Kitingan and other leaders such as Christina Liew, Daniel John and Moses Iking were again persuaded to stay by Tian Chua, Michael Bong and Datuk Dr Chua Jui Meng, who acted as emissaries for Dr Wan Azizah.
It was around the same time that those aligned to Kitingan, purportedly the “dirty dozen”, tried to form a new party — Parti Cinta Sabah — but failed.
This act prompted PKR’s disciplinary committee to suspend membership of all the 12 for a year, effective Jan 4, this year.
On Oct 17, Zaid, days prior to flying to Sabah to meet Kitingan, had announced his six months’ leave from the party’s political bureau meetings but not from PKR itself.
Meanwhile, the party insider also told the New Straits Times that there is no way that the party leaders will entertain the demand for a halt to the elections.
“They are under pressure to complete the elections in time for the submission of their annual report to the Registrar of Societies by December.
“But certain quarters felt this reason is just a ploy. They can send a letter asking for an extension for three months from the ROS if they are serious about it,” he said.
Meanwhile, PKR’s central election committee chairman, Dr Molly Cheah, confirmed that Zaid is now officially out of the race for the party deputy presidency.
“Zaid had sent us an official letter yesterday and the decision was made in our meeting with the political bureau, chaired by Dr Wan Azizah, the same day,” she said.
Azmin, who is a vice-president, is leading the race with 6,467 votes, followed by Zaid with 3,988 and Mustaffa Kamil Ayub with 1,215.
