What’s Mahathir up to?
There are no fundamental differences between Mahathir, Muhyiddin and most UMNO-PAS leaders. They all want a Malay unity government; they all want to keep Anwar from becoming prime minister and they all dislike the DAP. They have, in fact, more in common than not.
Dennis Ignatius, Focus Malaysia
KUALA Lumpur is now a city awash in all sorts of meetings, press conferences and political manoeuvring. Plots are being hatched and dispatched. Deals are being made and unmade. Alliances are shifting, loyalties are up for sale. There are no permanent friends in this melee, only permanent self-interests; no noble intentions, just selfish ambitions.
In many ways, it’s an epic battle: one man (Dr Mahathir Mohamad, of course) against the rest of the world. Feigning old age, he says he wants only to serve the people while assuring everyone that it won’t be forever. He doesn’t want to lead Pakatan Harapan into the next election (never mind that nobody wants that); he just wants his old seat in Putrajaya back for the next couple of years.
To this end, he has been hard at work trying to gnaw away at Prime Minister Muhyiddin’s slender majority in parliament. He knows how fickle and utterly devoid of principles many of these politicians are. They are all looking out for their own interests. If he can create sufficient doubt about Muhyiddin’s prospects for survival, enough of them might be tempted to at least think about switching sides again. It’s a high stakes psywar, to say the least.
Interestingly, while he is going out of his way to tempt pro-Perikatan Nasional (PN) parliamentarians to cross back, he seems to be making no move to mend fences with Anwar Ibrahim who heads one of the biggest parties in PH. If Mahathir’s quest to return to power at the head of a PH coalition is to succeed, he will certainly need the support of PKR. And yet, he continues to remain hostile to Anwar.
Anwar has thus far declined to attend PH events chaired by Mahathir. In response to queries, Anwar said he did not attend because it was not an “official PH event.” That’s another way of saying that Mahathir has no business chairing PH events since he is no longer head of PH.
When asked about Anwar’s absence, Mahathir, in his usual mordacious manner, said, “As far as I’m concerned I have no problems with Anwar.” Continuing, he said, “Maybe, he has problems with me. But I don’t know. You have to ask him.” No problems with Anwar? After castigating him on numerous occasions as weak, impatient, power crazy, morally compromised and not sufficiently committed to the Malay agenda?
Clearly, after the way Mahathir conspired to block him, Anwar is in no mood to go along with Mahathir’s games. He is leader of the opposition now (though you’d never know it from his actions thus far) and he doesn’t seem inclined to play second fiddle to a man whose political survival now depends upon the very leaders he was willing to betray in pursuit of his great game.
In the meantime, Amanah and DAP appear to be like drowning men clutching at straws. They sit like zombies beside Mahathir and then rush off to attend Pakatan Harapan council meetings with Anwar in a Sisyphean endeavour to keep alive their hopes of returning to Putrajaya.
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