Who to save Selangor: The unlikely saviours

By admin-s Last updated Aug 13, 2014

The unfortunate state of affairs is that the conservative groups led by Hadi Awang holds a substantial amount of decision-making power, and he would expect PAS Selangor assemblypersons to toe the party line.

James Chai, Malay Mail Online

Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim (TSKI)’s embonpoint thumbs-up to the cameras after leaving His Royal Highness (HRH) of Selangor’s Palace remains one of the most iconic photos in this Selangor saga. As we have later found out, TSKI had attained the consent of HRH to continue as Menteri Besar (MB) of Selangor, with the confidence of the majority of the Selangor State Assembly.

Since all PKR and DAP Selangor state assemblypersons have made it explicitly clear that they do not support TSKI (and this was reaffirmed at the press conference at PKR HQ, August 12), TSKI’s “confidence of the majority” could only be made up of Umno’s 12 state assemblypersons and 15 of PAS’s assemblypersons. Together with TSKI — now an independent candidate after PKR sacked him — the majority is 28 against the 27 assemblypersons of the remaining Pakatan Rakyat, i.e. 13 PKR assemblypersons and 14 DAP assemblypersons since Hannah Yeoh would not be able to cast her vote since she has to maintain her impartial role as the Speaker of the Assembly.

So it is 28 against 27 — these were the numbers TSKI most likely presented to HRH, since PKR and DAP are “absolutely certain” that they had no possible “traitors” from their own camp willing to defect from the parties.

The most silent group in this scenario appears not to be BN assemblypersons though. Following Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s announcement of the full public support from the 12 BN assemblypersons towards TSKI, the question remains on where the PAS assemblypersons stand.

The sacked Khalid vengefully sacks six others

Yesterday, TSKI greeted the crisis with another dramatic blow, by an authoritarian, unethical, and irrational sacking of the six out of 10 executive councils. This places further doubts on whether PAS had effectively gone to the other side of the divide. This is because the four remaining EXCOs that came from PAS were not sacked but retained, and the sacked ones were members of PKR and DAP respectively. Qualms were compounded and emotions enraged when rumours circulated heavily that PAS had sold Pakatan Rakyat (PR) out and could possibly return the resource-rich Selangor state back to the bad boys of BN.

What awaits the transition are the appointments of a few BN and a few PAS assemblypersons as EXCO members, and there you have it: BN back in power.

If that is essentially the situation at present, with TSKI potentially leading one of the greatest frauds in Malaysia’s political history, DAP and PKR are on the downside with only 27 votes — unable to remove TSKI by a vote of no-confidence.

The legal precedent set from the controversial case of Dato’ Seri Ir Hj Mohammad Nizar bin Jamaluddin v. Dato’ Dr Zambry bin Abd Kadir allows for the vote of no-confidence to be determined by other means than a vote at the legislature. This translates to therefore, to “save Selangor”, the state of Selangor will depend on the remaining PAS Selangor assemblypersons to publicly show their support for Pakatan Rakyat, and stand in solidarity to denounce and stand in no-confidence for TSKI continuing as MB of Selangor.

A plea to PAS Selangor Assemblypersons

So where does PAS assemblypersons stand on this? Is it true, as TSKI claimed, that you are in support of him?

In your consideration of this momentous decision, this is a plea — a stern and insistent one — to all PAS Selangor assemblypersons for you as public office holders to acknowledge the potential abyss Selangor is sinking into and remember the trust from the votes Selangorians have cast in you.

Without the support of PAS Selangor assemblypersons to state their no-confidence towards TSKI, what Selangor will be facing is a two-thirds state seat majority, together with 60 per cent of overall popular votes given to Pakatan Rakyat’s agenda and ideals, effectively be returned to BN government, one which Selangorians have voted to denounce.

Make no mistake, many of the non-Malay votes (deciders in many cases) that were cast to PAS in Selangor were only cast because PAS is part of the Pakatan Rakyat coalition and the promises were more attractive and desirable to them than the BN opponent. It is very unconvincing for PAS to imagine that the votes were attained on their own accord because of the “re-imaging and re-packaging” process PAS believes it has undergone that made them more moderate and therefore acceptable to non-Malay voters. This is rarely the case. In fact, many non-Malay votes will not be given to PAS had PAS not been part of the PR coalition.

Anti-Barisan Nasional campaign

Part of the coalition’s political campaigns was also largely effective from drawing criticisms from BN’s overall incompetent style of administration over the years, which delineates a perfect “anti-BN” picture. Despite having little experiences in administering a state and a nation compared to BN, Selangorians were willing to cast their votes and trust to PR, as long as it was not BN that governed them.

“Asalkan Bukan Umno (ABU)” became a slogan that represented the extent of the distaste people in Selangor have for BN government. It gained much popularity as it resonates with public grievances of BN’s governance filled with corruption, incompetence and abuse of power.

Selangorians are credited for its far-thinking capacity and the ability to dissect information more extensively through different channels of social media, and they chose convincingly that they had had enough of the corrupted and bigoted BN government in Selangor. Khir Toyo brings back nightmares for them.

Therefore, by agreeing to give confidence and be part of the “majority” TSKI claims was behind him supporting, is a blatant U-turn from the public vote given to PAS as part of PR. When Selangorians have voted convincingly to ensure the state is not governed by BN, PAS would now risk returning the powers to BN — which PAS pledged to prevent — through the back door.

Two core promises were instantly shattered: (a) PAS doesn’t allow the ideals of Pakatan Rakyat to be actualised by joining forces with BN to govern the state; and (b) giving a state away to an entity that 60 per cent of the votes and two-thirds of the state seats sought to prevent is an outright betrayal.