It’s PAS that BN fears the most

By strongly attacking PAS during the recent Umno general assembly, it shows that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak is afraid of the power of PAS.

COMMENT

It is now obvious that the 13th general election will not be held in December. One whole year the silly guessing game went on and on and in the end came to nothing.

In regard to the polls date, PAS Bukit Gantang MP Mohamad Nizar Jamaluddin is of the view that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak has still not decided yet.

“Parliament automatically dissolves on April 28 next year and after that, two months extension of time is given. This will bring us to June 28. The 13th general election may very well be held on June 28 if Najib thinks that he will lose,” said Nizar sarcastically.

PAS secretary-general Mustafa Ali guessed that the polls will be held after the Chinese Lunar New Year, either on Feb 24 or March 2 as it will be difficult for the Chinese working in Singapore to obtain leave as their leave was utilised for the Chinese New Year.

Be that as it may, Najib’s silly polls date guessing game has now backfired on him as the latest revelations by Musa Hassan and Deepak Jaikishan have put him in a tight spot.

Of course, he does not have to answer them but their revelations have served to delay the polls date further and now it has fallen into the abyss of uncertainty.

Barisan Nasional’s economic experts must not think that the polls delay will have no effect whatsoever on the local investment climate. Those who think that it has no impact on the foreign direct investment (FDI) are surely living on planet Pluto.

Who wants to invest in a climate of uncertainty? It is bad enough that the global investment climate is not that healthy either.

Weak commander

If BN wins the 13th general election, you can bet your bottom dollar that this silly game will again be played before the 14th general election.

The prime minister is thinking of his own political survival only. He is a weak commander. How so? Simply because he refuses to debate with Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim.

In Chinese culture, we want to see the martial arts skills of a one-to-one fight. And that is why MCA president Dr Chua Soi Lek dares to debate with Penang Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng. Chua wants to show off his kungfu skills.

As for Najib, how can he command the army if he lacks the courage to debate?

This is like a battle scenario. If the commander is afraid, then the war generals and the soldiers will lose confidence because they can always sense the fear of the commander.

At the height and in the heat of the battle, the commander is indecisive in giving orders. He may shout to his troops to go forward but he himself is firmly ensconced way at the back. What will the soldiers do then? Simple – they will just abandon the battle.

Of course, in the present political scenario, BN can still win due to the dirty voter rolls and the re-delineation of parliamentary and state seat boundaries.

The power of PAS

By strongly attacking PAS during the recent Umno general assembly, it shows that Najib is afraid of the power of PAS.

When it comes to mobilising people for rallies, for example the Bersih rallies, PKR and DAP need to rely on PAS.

Those Chinese who are thinking of booting out BN by only voting for PKR and DAP but leaving out PAS are stupid.

Without the power of PAS, BN cannot be toppled. This is because it is mainly PAS which is going head-to-head against Umno. And therefore now the PAS state government in Kelantan is being sabotaged in order to give bullets to MCA to woo the Chinese voters.

Thus in the seats where Malays are the majority, the non-Malays must vote for PAS. That can be the swing factor.

Those who want to see BN lose the general election must vote for PAS. If PAS collapses, Pakatan Rakyat will fail.

Of course, all three Pakatan component parties cannot afford to do badly but nonetheless the main battle is PAS versus Umno as Malays make up the majority in this country.

Although there are one or two slightly fundamentalist leaders in PAS, overall they are certainly not fanatics or extremists as the evil media portrays them to be.

In fact, there are more crazy people in BN, some of them with a hobby of bringing up the May 13 topic every now and then.

It is time to put an end to the age of uncertainty. It really is an irony when Najib tells the rakyat to vote BN for certainty because, according to him, voting for Pakatan only brings uncertainty.

And yet the polls date is still under the cloud of uncertainty!

Selena Tay is a FMT columnist.