With friends like Puad you don’t need enemies
Puad had cost the nation about RM1 billion from 2015 to 2018. Najib still got ousted and Umno-Barisan Nasional got wiped out in GE14. Hence the RM1 billion was a total waste of money. In spite of that, Umno is still using Puad as their attack dog.
NO HOLDS BARRED
Raja Petra Kamarudin
Yesterday, the High Court granted Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin an interim injunction against Puad Zarkashi pending the outcome of an inter-parte hearing (READ MORE HERE).
But this story is more than just the story of how Muhyiddin managed to muzzle Fuad. It is a story of how Puad was supposed to save Najib Tun Razak’s arse but failed to do so.
Rosli Dahlan, Muhyiddin’s lawyer, has muzzled Umno’s Puad Zarkashi
This story started six years ago, in March 2015, when Najib appointed Puad as Umno’s psywar chief. Puad was supposed to be Malaysia’s interpretation of WWII Germany’s Joseph Goebbels and the unit he was given to head was the Special Affairs Department or JASA.
The set-up cost of JASA was close to RM100 million and it had an annual budget of RM160 million. The emoluments for JASA’s 272 staff came to about RM13 million a month.
As the head of JASA and armed with this ‘official’ budget of RM500 million and a slush fund of another RM500 million (from 2015 to 2018), Puad was supposed to save Najib from getting wiped out by Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who had just launched the anti-Najib campaign a month earlier.
Mahathir launched the anti-Najib campaign in Jan-Feb 2015 and the target for the fall of the PM was July 2015
In January and February 2015 (after the December 2014 police report against 1MDB), Mahathir met up with a number of tycoons, activists, journalists and bloggers to plan an attack on Najib. They were going to use the 1MDB scandal as the weapon to attack Najib.
In that anti-Najib campaign team were Khairuddin Abu Hassan, Matthias Chang, Jahabar Sadiq, Tong Kooi Ong, Clare Rewcastle Brown, Xavier Andre Justo, Tony Pua, C4, Bersih, Sarawak Report, Malaysian Insider, a number of MACC people (the Chief Commissioner included), the Attorney-General, the Bank Negara Governor, the IGP, the Special Branch, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah plus a number of other Umno people, and many more.
It was a very powerful team and the deadline for Najib to be ousted was July 2015 and no later than that.
Puad is the same person who, in April 2008, called for the resignation of then Prime Minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi after UMNO’s poor performance in the 2008 general election.
When Najib replaced Abdullah as Prime Minister a year later in April 2009, Puad was rewarded for his ‘success’ and was appointed the Deputy Education Minister.
Anyone wearing a sleeveless, V-neck T-shirt is a homosexual, says Puad
In September 2012, Puad attracted controversy when he said that homosexuals could be identified through various means including the use of “V-Neck and sleeveless clothing” as well as a person’s personal preference for “tight and light-coloured clothing”.
Puad stated that these characteristics were “symptoms” which would allow parents to spot whether or not their son may be a homosexual, supporting the need to discipline them into turning straight “like it’s a disease which can be cured” – a stance that is also endorsed by Malaysia’s Education Ministry because they believe that this could actually affect one’s ability to learn.
Puad resigned as the director-general of JASA on 25th April 2018 to protest not being picked as a Barisan Nasional candidate for the 2018 general election or GE14.
However, Najib and Umno-Barisan Nasional lost the general election. And this is because Fuad’s JASA had assured Najib that Umno need not have any electoral pact with PAS to win the general election. Intelligence reports said Barisan Nasional was going to win 135 parliament seats and PAS was going to get wiped out in Terengganu, Kelantan and Kedah and was not going to win a single seat.
Puad spent RM1 billion and still Najib-Umno fell
Puad had cost the nation about RM1 billion from 2015 to 2018. Najib still got ousted and Umno-Barisan Nasional got wiped out in GE14. Hence the RM1 billion was a total waste of money. In spite of that, Umno is still using Puad as their attack dog.
Umno has still not learned that with friends like Puad you don’t need enemies. Puad’s mouth is Umno’s greatest enemy. But Muhyiddin’s lawyer, Rosli Dahlan, has already muzzled that barking dog. So, let’s see what Puad does now. Anyway, if Puad is any good, Najib and Umno would not have got wiped out in GE14.
