PM ticket for Pakatan undecided, says PKR
By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani, The Malaysian Insider
PETALING JAYA, Nov 28 — PKR leaders have confirmed that Pakatan Rakyat (PR) has yet to decide on who will lead the federal government if the pact wins the 13th general election, widely speculated for early 2011.
PKR secretary-general Saifuddin Nasution Ismail said PR was still working on having a clear manifesto and building on the party’s common platform.
“We have never discussed about it. We did discuss in 1999 and 2004 and the choice was crystal clear. But for this coming general election, we have not discussed about it. I think we like to give priority to more crucial issues like strengthening Pakatan, coming out with a clear manifesto, elaborating on the common platform policies and going through a seat negotiation process with the clear criteria.
“I think that would be the criteria for Pakatan Rakyat rather than discussing who would be the prime minister,” he told The Malaysian Insider.
Former PKR vice-president R. Sivarasa added that the prime ministerial post will negotiated based on election result in terms of seats won by each party.
“We do not have to do it now because most coalitions are formed after the election. They have to sit down and look at the number of seats then negotiate. This is how it works in most democracies. It is actually more unusual to have pre-arrangements because nobody knows what will happen,” he said.
However, re-elected PKR Wanita chief Zuraida Kamarudin was confident that PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim will become the new prime minister.
“PM is naturally Anwar Ibrahim. That is being endorsed by DAP and PAS since day one so naturally the Pakatan spirit [is] to choose Anwar as PM and [the] DPM from the other parties,” said Zuraida, who had proposed to formalise Anwar’s role as party de facto leader.
Anwar is currently facing his second sodomy trial and The Malaysian Insider understands that Barisan Nasional (BN) leaders have privately agreed that the case needs to be addressed before the ruling federal coalition is confident of dissolving Parliament for the country’s 13th general election, which is not due until March 2013.
The former deputy prime minister was sentenced to nine years in prison for his first sodomy charge on August 8, 2000.
Saifuddin also said that PKR was confident of retaining its 31 parliamentary seat in the next national polls.
“Well, we are confident. Last time we won 31 parliamentary seats and we marginally lost 12 seats. The strategy is very clear and that is to win the 31 seats [in] which we are incumbent and try to win more seats in the 12 seats that we marginally lost. We know that PKR has a very strong support in Selangor so that will reflect our strength,” he said.
Newly-elected PKR vice-president Nurul Izzah Anwar, however, warned the party on the need to further prepare itself before it was fully ready to face the voters.
“In terms of the snap polls, we much prefer a longer time frame for the next general election. I think as a party member it is apparent that we have areas to improve on such as the machinery effectiveness, the actual number of active members that come to vote and identifying candidates for the next GE.
“I do believe we have sort of understood that right now we cannot be affective on all fronts but we do have our own competitive advantage and those are fundamental factors that we need to focus on,” she said.
