Does Azmin need PAS as much as PKR needs DAP?

Umar Mukhtar

Without PAS to help prop up Menteri Besar Azmin Ali’s government in Selangor, it may collapse. But keeping PAS as a partner, which would incur DAP’s wrath, would cause PKR to lose crucial Chinese votes in the mixed seats it competes in, and result in it being irrelevant at the polls.

Now PKR Vice-President Tian Chua in a lame show of loyalty to Azmin, declared that without PAS support at the polls, PKR might as well not put up a candidate, for it is sure to lose. So the coming internal pow-wow would question why is PKR in such a hurry to side with DAP to sideline PAS by joining DAP’s Pakatan Harapan which is out of bounds to PAS.

From the above, we conclude that it is vintage PKR to make decisions haphazardly, without examining the various ramifications of such decisions which have far-reaching implications. Didn’t PKR discuss this first internally and democratically, or is PKR run by presidential decrees? This is suspicious because it has been a habit of the proxy president to place Azmin in a lurch. Take it on the chin, Azmin. After all, you’re only No 3.

Of course, the above dichotomy only arose because, in Selangor, political hypocrisy amongst the former friends prevail over governance. Imagine members of a state cabinet not talking to each other and supposedly hating each other’s guts. And, meanwhile, Azmin is free to fook around with the State’s assets. Imagine just how much the Selangor electorate is short-changed just to tolerate hypocritical party idiosyncrasies.

Now the chickens are coming home to roost. The coming negotiations for seat allocations for PRU14 to avoid three-covered fights will threaten to spill cans of worms. Until when can Azmin still hold together his shaky state government? The political possibilities are immense. It may include electoral pacts where previously self-righteous leaders would swallow their words in the name of political pragmatism. Read: hypocricy. Otherwise, the opposition is toast.

It was interesting what Tian Chua had to say. While we know PKR stands to lose parliamentary seats like Sungai Petani, Selayang, Batu, Kelana Jaya and Telok Kemang, among the many, if DAP is pissed off with it, Tian Chua championed that PKR needs PAS votes too in order to survive. Which seats are those, I wonder? Is it that crucial enough to make PKR choose PAS over DAP? Looks like a zero-sum situation, if you are to listen to both sides.

It seems that PKR is just about the only national party that cannot stand alone. How pathetic. And it wants to be a lead party in ruling Malaysia. That’s what happens when you don’t spend enough time to develop a party ideology to attract your own followers. There are a few, but not enough to be reckoned with. Did we ever hear about DAP or PAS dying without PKR voters?

Buku Jingga or no Buku Jingga, PKR is a multi-racial party with no ideology, and it depends on the convenience of others’ selfish ploys. It used to be a powerful adhesive between strange bedfellows but that is now history. What’s left is a small pond of would-be froggies that big-fish DAP is contend to play in. And froggies led by two heads at that.