PR leaders dismiss Najib’s plea to youth
(Harakah Daily) – KUALA LUMPUR, May 30: Prime Minister Najib Razak’s weekend call on the youth to defend Barisan Nasional from being ousted from Putrajaya drew reactions from several leaders.
In a government-organised World Youth Day gathering in Putrajaya, Najib urged young people in the country to help him defend the administrative capital from “being auctioned off”, referring to an allegation often targeted at opposition parties.
Najib even drew comparison with Egypt’s mass youth movement that brought down decades of Mubarak dictatorship last February.
“You see one million youths in Tahrir Square, they had gathered there to bring the government down. But here, one million youth have gathered in Putrajaya to defend the government. Will you defend Putrajaya with me?” he asked in his address to a rally organisers called ‘1 Million Youth Gathering’ in Putrajaya.
“The opposition said that they want to auction off Putrajaya. Will we allow them to sell Putrajaya off? No! We won’t let them sell off Putrajaya because one million youth will be here to defend Putrajaya,” he added.
Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim however dismissed the call.
“No youth movement would support a decadent, corrupt, obsolete system, I am sure they (young voters) will not defend it,” said Anwar.
PAS information chief Idris Ahmad described Najib’s plea “a waste of time”, adding that the new generation would make their own assessment based on the information at hand, unlike in the past when only BN controlled the information flow through the use of traditional media. “The younger generation is no longer the group living in a cucoon away from information. Malaysian youth are active in the new media, and are exposed to the correct information.
“UMNO can only get support from people who are not informed, and the younger generation is not part of this group,” he said in his comments to Harakahdaily.
PKR’s Lembah Pantai member of parliament Nurul Izzah Anwar meanwhile called on the youth to unite for a new Putrajaya by supporting reforms.
