Anwar: Pakatan Harapan becoming weak due to stalemate on PM’s post

(The Star) – The Pakatan Harapan coalition has been seen as becoming weak due to the stalemate on who should be named as Pakatan Harapan Plus’ prime minister candidate, says PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

“We will be focusing on the candidate for prime minister but the current government will continue to win the hearts of MPs by giving them lucrative allowances, government-linked companies (GLC) or other cushy posts.

“We see how some of these ministers and deputy ministers, we don’t even know what they are doing in terms of their work or policies,” he said.

Pakatan Harapan Plus has not reached a decision on its prime minister candidate yet. It was reported that DAP and Amanah had backed a proposal for Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad to return as the premier for the third time.

According to the proposal, Anwar would be appointed as deputy prime minister and succeed Dr Mahathir in six months.

However, PKR has been adamant that Anwar should be named as the prime minister candidate.

The Port Dickson lawmaker explained that in all the Pakatan meetings with representatives from PKR, DAP and Amanah had never disputed on the mandate of the rakyat in 2018 or the promise in the transition of power.

“We must hold on to the mandate given by the rakyat in 2018 and most importantly, we must return to the foundation of our struggles.

“We cannot be left exposed and be at each other’s throats, be dragged here and there, fight and simply nominate a candidate according to our whims and fancy.

“This is not the Pakatan way,” he said in a Facebook Live session on Saturday (July 4).

He said that it is pertinent for Pakatan to focus on the struggles to fight for the people, to overcome poverty and rebuild the country.

Anwar said if Pakatan keeps harping on the prime minister’s candidate, then the current Perikatan Nasional government will continue to focus on distributing the wealth amongst each other.