Tickets sold out for high-tea with Dr M

Umno leadership not happy that former prime minister has been invited for a meeting and party secretary-general has warned against sowing discord.

KUALA LUMPUR: The Pusat Bandar Taman Cempaka Umno branch’s high tea meeting with former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad is becoming the talk of town and the organisers have run out of tickets.

There has been a rush to get tickets for the high tea meeting at the De Palma Hotel in Ampang, tomorrow.

The Umno leadership is not happy with the branch calling Dr Mahathir for the meeting, and party secretary-general Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor has warned against sowing discord.

The branch’s chief, Syed Saifuddin Syed Harman, said new tickets were being printed to cater for the high demand which would not include food and drinks, Malaysiakini reported.

He said many just wanted to hear what Mahathir had to say.

The high tea is themed “Kembalikan maruah perjuangan bangsa” (Restore the dignity of our race’s struggle).

The Umno branch also held one for Dr Mahathir in 2008, when he was on a warpath with then prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

Held at the same venue, the high-tea event then was titled ‘Fikir-fikirlah’ (Think about it) and was aimed at pressuring Abdullah, also known as Pak Lah, to step down as Umno president and prime minister.

Syed Saifuddin said about 1,200 people turned up at Hotel De Palma to hear Mahathir speak at that time.

However, he denied this event was to pressure Najib to step down or to pit Umno leaders against one another.

He said it was instead geared towards giving “aspiration to the rakyat to get a new and better leadership.”