PKR cannot be minor player in PH, govt, says Nurul Izzah

 The PKR deputy president candidate wants to ‘shake up’ its talks with allies.

Nurul Izzah Anwar said PKR’s loss of several important seats to PN in GE15 was a clear sign that the party’s strategies needed to be reevaluated. 

PETALING JAYA:

 Nurul Izzah Anwar has vowed to “shake up” the framework of negotiations with PKR’s allies if she is elected the party’s next deputy president.

She said PKR must not be relegated to being just a minor player in Pakatan Harapan (PH) or the unity government.

“I do not want us to reach a situation where we are the minor party. Since PKR’s inception, the highest percentage of Malay votes we ever achieved was in 1999, but even then, we did not reach 55%.

“Now, we always only garner 30% (of Malay votes), though the percentage is much higher in Selangor (compared with other states),” she said in a PKR election campaign event in Kuantan, Pahang last night.

Nurul Izzah said PKR’s loss of several important seats to Perikatan Nasional (PN) in the 2022 general election (GE15) was a clear sign that the party’s strategies need to be reevaluated.

“Many stronghold PH and Barisan Nasional (BN) seats went to PN, including Permatang Pauh and Kepala Batas. We have to think about this phenomena seriously,” she said.

Nurul Izzah lost the Permatang Pauh parliamentary seat to PAS’s Fawwaz Jan in GE15, losing by a majority of 5,272 votes.

The seat was deemed a stronghold for PKR having been held by Nurul Izzah’s parents, party president Anwar Ibrahim and Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, since 1982.

Anwar first won the federal seat in Penang in 1982 when he was in Umno. Following his sacking from Umno amid his fallout with then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Wan Azizah was elected the new Permatang Pauh MP in 1999.

The seat changed hands between Wan Azizah and Anwar, before Nurul Izzah was elected as its MP for the first time in 2018. She was Lembah Pantai MP for two terms prior to that. - FMT