Nik Aziz’s wily hudud agenda
Karpal might be thinking that he was dealing with more oddities: in response to Anwar, Karpal was “somewhat taken aback” with the stand of his client in the sodomy trial but avowed that Anwar’s stance was “personal and it does not reflect the stand of the PKR”. Karpal is correct on his prognosis of Anwar, who is in it for his self-preservation simply because his trial on charges of sodomising a young male aide would have been a non-starter if hudud laws were applied.
New Straits Times Editorial
PAS, or at least its feisty spiritual leader Datuk Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat, wants to desperately reinstitute its Islamic state and hudud agenda barely three months after it shelved its most cherished dream to make way for a tenuous but politically expedient welfare/benevolent state.
You have to ask why Nik Aziz, who is also the Kelantan menteri besar, would risk resuming a feud with the DAP. Wasn’t it Pas which rebranded itself when it surprisingly forged the “welfare/benevolent” state policy while electing that non-ulama political jester Mohamad Sabu as the party’s new deputy president.
It could not be a coincidence. The shelving of the Islamic state goal was embraced by Pas’ Pakatan partners, the DAP and PKR.
Even the feistier former PM Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad wryly remarked that DAP’s Karpal Singh emerged the true winner after rebuffing the Pas ideal for years.
That was that but suddenly, the nation was riveted by the controversy that Mat Sabu outrageously ignited: he re-classified the Communist terrorists who massacred the 25 Malay police officers and their families in Bukit Kepong decades ago as “freedom fighters” on the basis that the dead were “British” officers.
Even Karpal and his senior DAP colleague Tunku Abdul Aziz, for their entire critical stance against the BN government, could not so stomach Mat Sabu’s historical revisionism that they categorically made their feelings known in the mainstream media.
A month of intense debates later came Nik Aziz’s startling pronouncement: initially Pas was to discuss with PKR and DAP on the idea of forming an Islamic state, but this was quickly upgraded into total dismissal of anything the DAP might have to object.
Karpal steadfastly rejected Pas’ Islamic state pursuit as unconstitutional and impossible to implement. Kedah Pas wasn’t enthusiastic while religious maverick, Dr Asri Zainul Abidin, articulated that hudud laws were unsuitable because the time was not conducive.
Sensing an opportunity, PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim backed Nik Aziz’s declaration while asserting that in principle, Islamic law could be implemented without infringing non-Muslim rights.
Karpal might be thinking that he was dealing with more oddities: in response to Anwar, Karpal was “somewhat taken aback” with the stand of his client in the sodomy trial but avowed that Anwar’s stance was “personal and it does not reflect the stand of the PKR”.
Karpal is correct on his prognosis of Anwar, who is in it for his self-preservation simply because his trial on charges of sodomising a young male aide would have been a non-starter if hudud laws were applied.
The strict demand that FOUR morally-upright witnesses be produced as opposed to the alleged victim’s testimony supported by DNA evidence was Anwar’s natural defence. In the meantime, it didn’t take long before Pas’ (or Nik Aziz’s) true form re-emerged. That hardcore essence of pursuing the Islamic state and execution of hudud laws is in their DNA. It is like instructing a scorpion not to sting.
It is obvious that Nik Aziz loathed the “welfare/benevolent” concept to begin with when the party chartered that vision to appease its political partners on the thought that it could swing voters should a snap general election they cavort be called.
But force of habit compelled the wily old guard to revert his position, thus triggering the old feud with Karpal and his secular soul mates.
But what does this lead to? The return to the old political bread and butter issues are understandable but eventually problematic because it still clashes with the Federal Constitution besides the bad blood with the DAP.
Pas is fond of accusing Dr Mahathir as the influential individual who barred the formation of an Islamic state in Kelantan but that’s convenient scapegoating and cannot be a long-term plan.
The government, from the time of the founding fathers right to Dr Mahathir’s era and now to the Najib administration has found it fit to retain Malaysia’s moderateness while installing sensible Islamisation policies, a framework secularists have accommodated all these years.
Here are possible scenarios for Nik Aziz’s abrupt reversal:
– Could it be that Mat Sabu’s blighted history lesson was to distract detractors from his personal peccadillos; and,
– Because of Mat Sabu’s indiscretion, Nik Aziz’s born-again declaration was to avert a simmering electoral fall-out.
In Nik Aziz’s supposition: better to reconvene the feud with the DAP on the Islamic state quandary rather than get kicked in the rear by voters, especially former soldiers who valiantly fought the terrorists, on Mat Sabu’s poorly-judged departure from conventional wisdom that was a closure for the nation a long time ago.
