Hudud ‘thorn’ will bleed Pakatan
If unresolved, a political scientist warns, the opposition alliance may end up where it was prior to the 2004 general election, which saw BN winning its biggest mandate.
University Sains Malaysia (USM) political scientist Dr Sivamurugan Pandian said the alliance should speak with one voice to convince the public that they are on the same page. “If Pakatan does not do so, they are back to square one as it shows they are unable to reign in their idological differences and that the pact is nothing but a marriage of convenience,” he added.
Hawkeye, Free Malaysia Today
Pakatan Rakyat risks slumping back to square one if the alliance cannot conclusively tackle the proposed hudud legislation row.
University Sains Malaysia (USM) political scientist Dr Sivamurugan Pandian said the alliance should speak with one voice to convince the public that they are on the same page.
“If Pakatan does not do so, they are back to square one as it shows they are unable to reign in their idological differences and that the pact is nothing but a marriage of convenience,” he added.
They may end up in the pre-2004 position rather than in the elevated post-2008 strength where they won an unprecedent level of support to deny Barisan Nasional the customary two-thirds majority.
On one hand, the people have PAS, which is fundamentally sound about the need to adopt the hudud legislation as a prelude to the formation of an Islamic state governance in the country.
On the other is DAP, a party steep in socialist principles, which champions secularism and upholding of the Federal Constitution.
In the middle is PKR, whose political ideology is muted and mixed as the party is just a coming-together of all sorts consisting of disgrunted members from BN and non-governmental organisations with no clear political struggle outlined.
In this context, Sivamurugan said there is a political impact from the hudud issue regardless of how Pakatan may want to interpret it.
The hudud issue flared up again when Mentri Besar Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat spoke about adopting it and asked DAP to accept the law.
Both Pakatan and BN have their loyal supporters entrenched in the present two-party system but their future would be determined by the fence-sitters.
The fence-sitters now have a better prespective of things having experienced a taste of Pakatan’s governance in Kedah, Penang and Selangor besides Kelantan while everybody knows BN, Sivamurugan said.
They have also observed how Pakatan conducts itself as an alliance and as individual political entities, he added.
He said the proposed hudud legislation is a thorn in the side of Pakatan but in its latest debate, the surprising outcome was Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim’s expression of support for the law.
This alienates non-Muslim support for PKR, whom Anwar spearheads and perhaps can mean that the opposition leader is trying to reach out more to the Malay ground ahead of the next general election, he said.
Seats allocation issue
The hudud debate surfaced just when Pakatan is sitting down to mete out their seats allocation ahead of the general election.
Political observer Jason Wong, who works with a Singapore-based think tank, believes that both DAP and PAS are trying to muscle out PKR from certain seats since the latter is reeling from a spate of defections.
The sex allegations involving Anwar has also cast a cloud over the alliance’s ability to compete with BN in all states.
Anwar may need to placate PAS by agreeing to hudud while supporting DAP’s quest to win over more Malay support by allowing them to field Malay candidates, particularly in semi-urbanised seats, where the Malay electorate is greater, Wong speculated.
He claimed that the problem with Pakatan is the lack of synergy between what the national leaders are preaching and what the grassroots activists are clamouring for.
“When we converse to both levels, we wonder who is the honest one here. The national or the grassroots leaders?” he said.
