Hadi is back on centre stage

“Why should we help PKR win in Penang? Their boss is DAP,” said Penang PAS secretary Izuree Ibrahim.

Joceline Tan, The Star

A Bill that divided the nation has united PAS behind their president. He will be going into the PAS muktamar as a hero but he may not be able to stop those in his party who want to ‘divorce’ PKR.

IT was quite an emotional homecoming for Datuk Seri Hadi Awang. The PAS president landed at Kuala Terengganu airport on Monday evening to be greeted by PAS supporters who had jam-packed the arrival hall.

Chants of “Takbir!” and “Allah!” rang out as he came through the automatic glass doors in his grey jubah and maroon kopiah.

He seemed a little startled at the reception and after taking some questions from reporters he climbed into a black Toyota MPV to head back to his home and political base in Rusila.

The RUU355 is still stuck in Parliament, with little hope of moving forward, but the way the crowd was going on, it was as though the Private Member’s Bill had been passed. People whipped out their handphones to record the occasion and there was a long banner – Tahniah Selamat Kembali – congratulating and welcoming him back.

As the convoy of cars and motorcycles escorting him approached Rusila, Hadi could see people thronging the side of the road while more people were waiting in the new hall near the Rusila Mosque and school complex.

There was something special in the air, a sense that Hadi had gone where no other PAS president had been able to. A lot of it had to do with his centrestage moment in Parliament a few days earlier as well as the way some of the MPs had tried to top him and shout him down.

All that had stirred something deep inside them – a sense of siege, of a need to stand up and defend their president. It is a feeling that the cafe society on the west coast will never quite understand.

Hadi’s Rusila base is marked by a mosque with a tall minaret and a religious school whose students often go on to top universities in the Middle East.

It has been a stressful time for his party, a year when friends became enemies and enemies became friends and Hadi did not hold back when he spoke that evening, slamming DAP as a party born out of the “s**t of PAP”, the ruling party of Singapore. That was pretty strong language for an ulama but it was a sign of how PAS leaders feel about their arch enemy.

PAS is back to where it began – on its own, assured of its core support and it has once again put the religion up front and centre.

Hadi and his deputy Datuk Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man have won unopposed in the party election, which will take place at the end of this month.

This year’s party election seems like a fight between friendly rivals compared to the last party polls which was marked by open warfare.

Some of the nominees for the vice-presidency may even withdraw to let the three incumbents – Idris Ahmad, Datuk Mohd Amar Nik Abdullah and Datuk Iskandar Samad –- win unopposed.

The election muktamar of 2015 ended in acrimony. The losing camp left and went on to form Amanah and PAS broke off from Pakatan Rakyat.

All signs are pointing to another big break-up, this time with PKR.

A string of divisions in Kedah, Penang, Kelantan, Terengganu and even Selangor have passed resolutions urging the party to terminate ties with PKR.

Federal Territory commissioner Mohd Nor Mohamed has openly said that his party will contest against Amanah and PKR in seats like Lembah Pantai, Batu, Setiawangsa, Bandar Tun Razak and Putrajaya.

In Penang, all 13 divisions in the state have declared they will contest against PKR in the general election.

Some have described it as a tsunami warning from the PAS grassroots.

“Why should we help PKR win in Penang? Their boss is DAP,” said Penang PAS secretary Izuree Ibrahim.

Izuree said party members have been victimised by the DAP-controlled government and their members have been sidelined in posts in the JKKK or village committees.

He said the understanding was that the party contesting the seat would decide on the JKKK appointments for the area but he claimed that PKR had monopolised most of the appointments.

“Our members campaigned for them, put up their flags and banners but we don’t see even their shadow after they won,” he said.

Izuree also had a stormy relationship with the Penang government. He was sacked as a municipal councillor after he criticised the state government for being pro-developer.

Expectations and promises between PAS and PKR have not been fulfilled and the political marriage is in tatters.

PAS leaders were also furious with PKR’s Rafizi Ramli who has accused an ex-PAS leader of receiving funds from 1MDB.

PAS communications director Roslan Shahir, in a scathing Facebook posting, slammed Rafizi as a “champion of lies and slander”. He reminded everyone of how Rafizi had also wrongly accused former Selangor Mentri Besar Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim in order to topple him.

Some think the break-up talk is just a smokescreen.

Lawyer and former DAP politician Shamsher Singh Thind wrote in his Facebook: “PAS maki DAP, DAP maki PAS, tapi hakikatnya dua-dua main 69 kat Selangor”.

It was a rather crude mockery of how the two parties condemn each other but are still fooling around with each other in the Selangor government.

The party’s hour-long protest outside the Nanyang Siang Pau office earlier this week was also seen as some sort of pre-muktamar drama. The party was angered by a cartoon in the Chinese vernacular paper depicting Hadi and the Dewan Rakyat Speaker as monkeys swinging from a tree.

But PAS leaders are not above labelling their opponents as animals. Recently, a Kelantan PAS leader said that Amanah, which organised a seminar on the late Datuk Nik Aziz Nik Mat, was “bringing babi hutan (wild boars) into the garden of Nik Aziz”.

PAS has also broken off ties with Parti Pribumi after the latter joined Pakatan Harapan.

“Mahathir was a stumbling block. Our members cannot accept him,” said Roslan.

Their feelings about the former Premier are too bitter and deep. Decades of indoctrination against Umno and Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad could not be easily erased.

“He gave our party a terrible time especially after we won Kelantan in 1990, he used everything in his power against us,” said Dr Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar, the political secretary to Hadi.

Hadi has been vilified by critics of the RUU355. But among supporters, he is seen as having restored the party’s Islamic credentials.

Even PAS secretary-general and Kota Baru MP Datuk Takiyuddin Hassan who spoke for two hours on the bill in Parliament, received a hero’s welcome when he flew back to Kota Baru last week.

“Hadi understands his own personal power and charisma. There was a time when he would approach issues in a fierce and vociferous way.

“There is some sophistication nowadays,” said political commentator Eddin Khoo.

Khoo belongs to the cohort who regard the RUU355 as an encroachment on their constitutional rights.

He is concerned about the way the RUU355 has been presented – that if you do not support it or criticise it, then you are against Islam.

Hadi was the one pressing the buttons, making everyone jump up and down. In that sense, said Khoo, the issue has been a victory for PAS.

PKR has since voiced support for the PAS bill but the U-turn came too late in the day and was seen as a desperate effort to dissuade PAS from divorce proceedings.

Regardless of whether the bill succeeds or fails, PAS has dealt a blow to their rivals in Amanah as to who the real Islamic party is.

There will be a resurgence of support for Hadi at the muktamar. He is seen as the man who brought PAS back to the original path even if that path may lead to disaster in the general election.

“For PAS, the victory is not now but 10 years down the road,” said Khoo.

There will also be a rather poignant mood at the muktamar this time.

Many in PAS are aware that Hadi has been unwell the last one year. He has lost so much weight that even his face looks different these day. He used to be this robust person who enjoyed hearty meals, but not anymore. His gait is slower, even his voice is no longer that fierce and everyone can see that he tires quite easily.

Party insiders say it has to do with his heart condition. He is scheduled to undergo a major operation after the muktamar and that has made people in his party terribly anxious.

Hadi had hoped to wrap up the Private Member’s Bill at the last Parliamentary meeting and before going under the knife.

That way, he would be at peace, regardless of how the operation turns out.

But now, say his supporters, he will definitely want to live to fight another day.