‘Stop BTN poison on Malays’
By Harakah Daily
KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 14: Addressing a forum in an ‘enemy territory’, PAS secretary general Mustafa Ali (pic) lashed out at the government’s National Civics Bureau (BTN) programme, saying it was indoctrinating the minds of the Malays by claims that they would lose ‘political power’ without UMNO.
“If Malays are not with UMNO, they will be with PAS, which means it remains in the hands of Malays,” argued Mustafa, at a forum on the future of Malay leadership at Putra World Trade Centre over the weekend.
Saying Malay parliamentarians occupy 112 of the 222 seats in Dewan Rakyat, Mustafa reasoned that Malays could not lose their political power unless UMNO short-changed their constituencies like how it was in 2003.
In 2003, the UMNO-led Federal government refused to increase the number of parliamentary seats for the Malay heartlands such as Kelantan, Terengganu, Kedah and Perlis, while adding more seats in other states.
“When I represented PAS for Terengganu state government to discuss with Election Commission, they said they would at least add two parliamentary seats for Terengganu.
“When the motion was brought to Parliament, not a single parliament seat was added to any of the four states. The reason was UMNO’s fear that these seats would be won by PAS,” said Mustafa, pointing out an example to show that UMNO could not bother about Malay interests.
He added that the solution for the Malays was to return to the true teachings of Islam, saying Islam would transformed the Malays for the better.
Mahathir is courageous, but…
Mustafa also described former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad as a “courageous man” who had unfortunately misplaced his courage by discriminating the Malays.
