PAS’ political maturity starts to shine in Selangor MB impasse

By admin-s On Aug 19, 2014

BN-Umno would not have hesitated to push for a state election if the state government had collapsed. Were PKR and DAP aware of this?

Ng Kee Seng, The Ant Daily

Which party in Pakatan Rakyat is the most competent and experienced to fight Umno? Isn’t it obvious from the Selangor Menteri Besar impasse or crisis?

Surely not the Anwar-led PKR or the DAP.

If not for PAS, the Selangor state assembly would have been dissolved weeks ago and the Umno-led Barisan Nasional (BN) would be laughing its way to snap state elections in which Pakatan risks losing Malaysia’s richest state.

Whether Malaysians like it or not, PAS is the only federal opposition party with the competency and experience to fight Umno in politics.

After all, the Islamic party has been battling with Umno since its founding in 1948, two years after the birth of Umno.

PAS worked briefly with BN-Umno but it was outmanoeuvred by Umno and lost control of Kelantan for 12 years (from 1978 to 1990) to BN-Umno.

The Kelantanese returned their support to PAS in 1990 and the mandate to rule Kelantan has remained with PAS until today.

In the 12^th General Election (GE12), PAS won big with PKR and DAP. PAS was given the mandate to rule Perak (briefly before the infamous power grab by BN-Umno with the help of three defectors from PKR and DAP) and Kedah.

Evidently, GE12 showed that PAS had more to gain politically by working with PKR and DAP in Pakatan than with Umno in BN.

PAS would never be given the chance to rule Perak and Kedah or even Terengganu in the Umno-led BN ruling coalition.

Clearly, PAS would benefit more by remaining in Pakatan and the Selangor MB impasse was never about PAS’ loyalty to Pakatan.

After all, PAS possibly cannot have forgotten how it was unfairly treated in Kelantan and Terengganu on its rights to oil royalty, and how Umno had used its vast federal influence to bully it in Perak and Kedah.

The fact that none of the PAS elected representatives had defected to Umno to bring down Perak, Kedah, Terengganu or Kelantan is telling.

It is only fair to deduce that the PAS elected representatives were more politically principled and loyal to the struggles of their party than others. This also makes them more trustworthy.

Perhaps, PKR and DAP would do well to seek the advice of PAS on how to identify and select more trustworthy candidates for GE14.

And the fate of two PAS Selangor assemblymen, Hulu Kelang’s Saari Sungib and Morib’s Hasnul Baharuddin, is now hanging in the balance after they pledged support for PKR president Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail to take over as Selangor MB.

The duo claimed that they risked disciplinary action from their party for the survival of Pakatan in Selangor. Can anyone in Pakatan really fault them for putting Pakatan above self and party interests?

Shouldn’t the actions of the duo be deemed in Pakatan’s interest?

The statements issued by PAS leaders, especially Shah Alam MP Khalid Samad, prior to the PAS Central Working Committee (CWC) meeting on Sunday (Aug 17) are worth studying.

The CWC decided that PAS remains loyal to Pakatan, thereby wiping out any hope of Umno working with independent MB Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim and PAS to grab Selangor from Pakatan.

The CWC also decided that Khalid must be replaced with either Wan Azizah or her deputy Azmin Ali.

However, Azmin has gone on record to say that he is giving way to Wan Azizah.

This has cleared the way for PKR to submit only the name of Wan Azizah to the Selangor Sultan as the new MB.

The question now is whether the Sultan will heed the will of the people and the majority, when he returns from overseas, to swear in Wan Azizah as the new and first woman chief executive of a Malaysian state.

Prior to the CWC, PKR and DAP had been condemning PAS for having its four executive councillors staying put to keep the independent Khalid’s Selangor government afloat.

Khalid Samad had said that “by taking more time to make a decision, PAS is giving enough rope for Khalid to hang himself (politically)”.

He also said Khalid’s statements and actions, like saying “there is no Pakatan government” and the sackings of PKR and DAP state executive councillors, showed that Khalid was not loyal to Pakatan.

Khalid Samad had also explained that PAS was of the view that the present government should be maintained despite its crippled state, and withdrawing its support for Khalid before a successor was agreed upon could lead to snap state polls because it leaves nobody with majority support in the state assembly.

That made a whole lot of sense. BN-Umno would not have hesitated to push for a state election if the state government had collapsed. Were PKR and DAP aware of this?