Mat Sabu: We’ll accept PAS MPs who want to defect

(FMT) – Amanah will not prevent PAS MPs from joining them, should the Islamist party form an alliance with Umno, Mohamad Sabu said.

The Amanah president, fondly known as Mat Sabu, said he prayed for the two parties to unite “in full view of others”, The Star reported.

“I want them to be together,” the English daily quoted the defence minister as saying.

Mat Sabu said this when opening the Selangor Amanah convention today.

Earlier, Mohamad took a swipe at Umno and PAS for wanting to work together despite losing in the May 9 polls.

The two parties, he claimed, have been talking about forming an alliance even when he was in PAS.

Mat Sabu joined PAS in 1981 and rose through the party ranks to become the party’s deputy president.

In 2015, together with several parliamentarians, he left the party to set up the then Gerakan Harapan Baru, before the name was changed to Parti Amanah Negara.

Last night, Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi called for a merger with PAS, urging the two parties to set aside their differences in the “name of Islam, Malays, Malaysia and Bumiputeras”.

The former deputy prime minister said it would be a mistake for the two parties to be at loggerheads.

Zahid had said this at a gathering to oppose the ratification of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) in Perak.