UMNO to form a new government with PH?
Recently, Pakatan Harapan (PH) claimed that Sembrong MP Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein is conducting a campaign to form a new coalition with parties in the ruling government except DAP and Amanah.
The former Defence Minister was alleged to be trying to unite the Malay-based parties as one coalition.
In this case, the rumoured coalition will be comprised of UMNO, PAS, Bersatu and PKR.
However, it was previously reported that PKR is not a race-based party. Hence, its party president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim was not invited to the Malay Dignity Congress; his initial reason for not attending the event.
During the Malay Dignity Congress on October 6, PKR deputy president Datuk Seri Azmin Ali was one of the politicians sitting at the VIP section along with Bersatu chairman Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, PAS president Datuk Seri Abdu Hadi Awang and UMNO secretary-general Tan Sri Annuar Musa.
After the event, Anwar clarified that he was invited to the congress, but the invitation arrived late, and he couldn’t make it.
Nevertheless, PKR is not a race-based party as there are numerous non-Malay members in the party. Some of the non-Malay top leaders in PKR are vice-presidents Tian Chua, Xavier Jayakumar and Chang Ling Kang.
On the other hand, Amanah is closer to be a Malay-based party; technically it is a religious-based party like PAS. But there seems to be a blurred line between ‘Malay’ and ‘Muslim’ in Malaysian politics.
It was also noted that Amanah president Mohamad Sabu was not one of the top Malay leaders during the Malay Dignity Congress; he was not seated with other leaders like Mahathir, Azmin, Hadi Awang and Annuar Musa.
Nevertheless, it is reasonable for the rumoured coalition to not include Amanah because the party is a splinter party of PAS following the Hudud issue which led to the fallout of Pakatan Rakyat in 2015.
The majority of Amanah leaders were politicians who supported DAP when PAS was pushing for Hudud implementation in the country.
The formalisation of Penyatuan Ummah shows that UMNO has decided to work with PAS, which means working with Amanah is not happening.
Ironically, UMNO is willing to work with Bersatu, the latter being a splinter party of the former. The UMNO exodus which witnessed its party members jumping to Bersatu did nothing to improve the relationship between both parties.
Pontian MP Datuk Seri Ahmas Maslan said that the issue of forming a new government with the rumoured coalition happened because PH failed to resolve the date for the handover of the premiership to Anwar.
He also hinted that the issue will arise again if PH is still uncertain on the power transition by May next year.
In this case, is the formation of the rumoured coalition to fight for the Malay rights, which was claimed to be side-lined by Pakatan Harapan, or is it to elect Anwar, who was ironically absent during the Malay Dignity congress, as the eighth Malaysian Prime Minister?
If the answer is the latter, then Bersatu will not be a part of the coalition, along with several PKR members.
In other words, the rumoured coalition will consist of UMNO, PAS and Anwar’s camp in PKR.
Overall, there are too many inconsistencies when it comes to the narration of fighting for Malay rights.
Do Malaysians still believe in racial politics which seem to benefit the politicians more rather than the people?