Anwar vows never to surrender until GE13 results validated

Anwar says he will not stop until justice is served. — Reuters picKUALA LUMPUR, May 13 — Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim vowed last night never to surrender Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) fight to ensure the pact claims its rightful place in Putrajaya, maintaining his stance that Barisan Nasional (BN) had cheated its way to victory on May 5.

The de facto PR leader, looking energetic and full of gumption as he addressed thousands of black-clad supporters at PR’s third post-Election 2013 rally in Ipoh, acknowledged that it has been a week since the polls results were formally announced.

But he insisted that although Datuk Seri Najib Razak has been sworn in as prime minister and it appears to be business as usual for the ruling pact in Putrajaya, the BN chairman and Umno president was not the actual person chosen for the job.

“Umno leaders would say, ‘we have the mandate so you shut up’. But I say — ‘No way’. We have the mandate and we will... lawan tetap lawan (keep on fighting),” he thundered, urging the crowd to sound PR’s often-used rallying cry along with him.

“Najib has been endorsed as having won... and he has been sworn in. What should we do?

“So that is why we say.... in Kelana Jaya, we amassed hundreds of thousands of people with just two days’ notice... In Penang, hundreds of thousands turned up in Batu Kawan... the people’s uprising.

“Why? Because the voice of the people is sacred,” the prime minister hopeful continued, unabated.

“On Tuesday, we gather in Kuantan. On Wednesday in Johor. And we will not stop until justice is served in this country.

“We will not stop until the valid results are announced. Yes. We will continue and we will never surrender,” he added, according to a live streaming of the event last night.

Anwar and his team in PR have insisted that the just-concluded May 5 polls were rigged, citing irregular voting patterns, suspicious handling of ballot boxes and other issues.

Claiming to have gathered sufficient evidence to back their claims, lawyers from both the DAP and PAS are mulling filing election petitions to contest the results.

PR officials say they are disputing up to 29 election results and the rallies, which began in Selangor last Wednesday, moved on to Penang on Saturday and Perak last night, will continue in Kuantan on Tuesday, followed by Johor on Wednesday.

The ruling BN pact soared to a narrow victory on May 5 with just 133 federal seats to PR’s 89, significantly lower than the 140 seats it won in Election 2008.

But even more daunting for BN was that it lost the overall popular vote, garnering just under 48 per cent of the votes cast, a significant three-percentage point lower than PR’s 51 per cent.

In Perak, BN fared even worse, polling just 507,123 or 45.25 per cent of the votes cast, trailing behind PR’s 613,490 votes or 54.75 per cent, despite sailing to an overall victory in the silver state with 31 seats in the 59-seat assembly.

Perak PR leaders have cried foul over the results, insisting that administrative power over the state should be theirs as the majority of Perak folk had voted against BN.

In his speech earlier, Anwar also slammed senior Umno leader Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz for claiming that the Chinese community who voted against BN had been misled into thinking that a government led by PR would lead to the abolishment of Bumiputera and Malay rights.

The Permatang Pauh MP denied this, pointing to a signed agreement between all three PR parties — the DAP, PKR and PAS — which formally endorsed all provisions in the Federal Constitution, including Article 153, which touches on the special privileges of the country’s dominant ethnic group.