The old man who strikes fear in BN

Nik Aziz, now 82 and ailing, may be the one person standing in the way of Umno’s capture of Kelantan.

GUA MUSANG: PAS spiritual adviser Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat has been relying less on a walking stick since Parliament was dissolved last month.

The iconic PAS leader began using a wooden cane last year due to a host of ailments affecting his joints, his heart and a kidney.

He had heart surgery in 2004, an election year in which Umno came close to unseating the Kelantan government.

After recovering from that surgery, the Islamic scholar and statesman, now 82, unleashed a new breed of activists to take over the second echelon of the PAS leadership and attract the support of young voters.

These personalities possess both economic acumen and deep religious knowledge. They include vice president Husam Musa, deputy secretary-general Takiyuddin Hassan and one of Nik Aziz’s two deputies in his role as Kelantan PAS chief, Nik Mohd Amar Abdullah.

The strategy worked. PAS won 35 of the 48 Kelantan state seats in the 2008 election. Of the 14 parliament seats in the state, it won 10.

But Umno did not take the defeat lying down. Within a year, it became evident that it had regrouped to preach about Malay unity and the alleged danger that the new liberal political culture posed to the poor members of the community.

As the nation gets ready for tomorrow’s polling, some pundits are saying they sense a significant gravitation towards BN among Malays and Indians in Kelantan.

However, the Chinese in the state, are not just swinging, but stampeding towards Pakatan. Some say they are impressed not only by Pakatan rhetoric, but also—and perhaps more significantly—by Nik Aziz’s unshakeable stand against BN and its policies and behaviour.

Indeed, it is safe to say that the last five years have seen Nik Aziz increasing in stature not only in Kelantan but throughout the peninsula as well, especially among the Chinese.

Even BN is careful not to be too harsh on him—at least ostensibly, for there is enough circumstantial evidence to suggest that it has outsourced the more unpalatable slanders to its cybertroopers.

In any case, Nik Aziz has never been detained under any of the country’s draconian laws and his religious school in Pulau Melaka has been allowed to grow without interference from his political enemies.

He is said to be even more popular than Pakatan chief Anwar Ibrahim, and whenever he is one of the featured speakers in a Pakatan forum or rally, he is the one who speaks last.

Nik Aziz, as if to explain why he was now less dependent on a walking stick, said recently that campaigning for Pakatan Rakyat had been good for his heath. Of course, he thanked God for it, but he said his one great motivation was to defeat Umno.