DAP rejected the Melaka quartet but out-voted by PKR and Amanah, Guan Eng says
(Focus Malaysia) – DAP has apparently put its foot down on the issue of courting the Melaka quartet to contest under its ticket in the Melaka state election but claims was outgunned by its allies.
“We discussed the matter at the DAP central executive committee last night and decided to reject the Melaka quartet.
“But we only managed to convince our partners to reject two of them,” DAP secretary general Lim Guan Eng said, in a statement.
Two days ago, Malaysiakini reported PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim as saying that three from the quartet cannot be rejected as they were merely attempting to restore Pakatan’s mandate in the state government.
“Now, there are people on social media who want us to reject them. That is not right. They supported efforts to restore (Harapan’s) mandate,” he was reported saying.
The Opposition Leader also confirmed that the trio, Datuk Seri Idris Haron, Datuk Nor Azman Hassan and Datuk Noor Effandi Ahmad had met Melaka’s Pakatan leadership prior to withdrawing support for the UMNO-led state administration.
“The understanding (between the three and Harapan) was that they wanted to join us. If they take action later, they know they will be sacked from their parties.
“Therefore, we cannot just sideline them. I will have to discuss more with the (PKR) leadership in Malacca and then with the Harapan leadership. We have to take these issues into account before making a decision,” the Port Dickson MP added.
However, Anwar courted brickbats from the public for his statement, saying the former should have learnt his lesson after he himself got stabbed in the back numerous times by allies in the past.
PKR vice president Rafizi Ramli yesterday criticised Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah) for insisting on the Melaka trio and reminded opposition leaders of the betrayal suffered under the hands of Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia.
“My colleagues and I who represented PKR in the Presidential Council had pushed for Bersatu to only be accepted as an election ally and not a full-fledged member of the coalition.
“Those who insisted on having Bersatu as a component party were the leaders from Amanah and DAP, whose excuse was that PKR was weak and divided.
“At one point, PKR was handed an ultimatum – had they persisted, it would be reasonable for the party to part ways with the coalition, seeing as to how Amanah and DAP had already decided to accept Bersatu,” the former Pandan MP was reported saying.
Let good sense prevail!
On that note, Lim said that DAP had been outvoted on the trio by PKR and Amanah and was forced to abide by the majority decision made.
“But we hope that good sense will prevail in Pakatan. We our partners to choose allies carefully and only accept those who sincere, not political opportunists.
“Let us not make the same mistake again and lose the moral high ground by allowing those from the Melaka quartet to stand as our candidate in the Melaka polls,” stated the former finance minister.
The nomination for the state polls is scheduled on Nov 8, with the election on Nov 28.
