GE14: Mahathir accuses PAS of making it easy for BN
The Pakatan Harapan chairman says PAS has laid down conditions that will split and reduce the opposition’s votes.
(FMT) – Dr Mahathir Mohamad today accused PAS of facilitating victory for the Barisan Nasional (BN) led by Prime Minister Najib Razak by refusing to back off from engaging in three-cornered fights in the upcoming 14th General Election (GE14).
The chairman of Pakatan Harapan (PH) and PPBM said when PAS was invited to collaborate with the opposition pact, it had laid down conditions that would certainly split and reduce the votes for PH.
Without specifying what these conditions were, Mahathir said PAS was more concerned about its enmity with Amanah and DAP than in bringing down the BN government, even though the Islamist party was bound to incur losses in the contests between the two coalitions and itself.
“For PAS, race, religion and nation are not important, and neither is toppling Najib’s kleptocratic government,” Mahathir, 92, said in his blog today.
“What is clear is that if PAS runs in GE14 against BN and PH, the Malay votes will be split three ways.
“In this situation, votes for PAS, though they be small, would be effective in reducing the votes for PH such that Datuk Seri Najib and BN would be assured of victory,” he said.
The former prime minister added that PAS would only serve as a disruptor for the opposition in most of the constituencies where it will contest.
He said the party’s intention to run in all the parliamentary seats it had contested in the last general election in May 2013 would lead to it losing more seats in GE14 than it did previously.
He said the Islamist party would not be able to enjoy the support of Chinese, Indian and pro-DAP voters as it did since the 12th General Election in March 2008.
“PAS knows that its victories along the western coast (of Peninsular Malaysia) in GE12 and GE13 were due to the support of DAP and the Chinese,” he said.
He said PAS must also be aware that without such support, it would even lose any straight fight with BN in the western states.
“Without DAP’s backing, PAS would normally lose in the western coast where the number of Malay voters is not as high as along the east coast.”
He said it had won its share of parliamentary seats in the last two elections because of its political cooperation with DAP, referred to with the Arabic phrase “tahaluf siyasi”.
PAS won 23 parliamentary seats in the election of 2008 and 21 in 2013.
Mahathir said fanatical supporters vowed allegiance to PAS’ leadership and were obsessed with the party, which only served to divide the Malay votes in the belief that PAS’ opponents were “kafir” (infidels) and fighting them was “jihad” (religious war). They needed to repent, he said.
He claimed this was because these supporters were following PAS’ teachings that were in conflict with the Islamic doctrine that Muslims were brothers.
Mahathir, who was PM for 22 years until 2003, said PAS could only get into the federal government by joining BN.
“PAS will lose in most of the constituencies it will contest in and remain in the opposition,” Mahathir said.
“Not a single one of its struggles, which they claim to be for Islam, have been accomplished since the day it was formed.”
On Aug 28, the PH presidential council made a decision not to cooperate with PAS in GE14.
In a joint statement after the council’s meeting, the coalition’s leaders said PH would instead be preparing a strategy to manage the expected three-cornered contests in the election.
