INTERVIEW | Umno supreme council member Razlan Rafii said Perikatan Nasional should give BN room to govern states in the south of the country, with similar compromises made in states controlled by PN.
He said there should therefore be some “give and take” in allocating seats between BN and PN ahead of the upcoming Malacca state election.
“Allocate the seats in Malacca as best as possible. Say BN is strong in the southern states, then let BN govern the south.
“In the east, when it comes to those areas, you (PN) can govern there. It would be good if there were an understanding like this.
“In Kelantan, Terengganu, Kedah and Perlis, these states should also be governed together with BN, and I hope that when seat negotiations take place, there can be something along those lines, with some give and take,” he said in an interview with Malaysiakini.
Razlan said he hoped no party would seek ways to drive a wedge between the two coalitions by putting forward analyses that merely served their respective interests.
“Let us not look for ways to divide ourselves. (Proposals based on) all these analyses are ways of creating divisions... ways of finding excuses for the negotiations to fail. We in BN and they in PN must be open-minded and discuss this together,” he added.
Follow Negeri Sembilan’s example
Elaborating, Razlan said that if BN and PN could find a solution in Negeri Sembilan, there was no reason the same could not be done in Malacca.
BN previously contested 25 seats in the Negeri Sembilan state election held on Aug 1.
The decision followed an understanding reached with PN, which was allocated 11 seats to contest.
The agreement saw BN and PN wrest Negeri Sembilan back from Pakatan Harapan, which had governed the state for the past eight years.
In the Aug 1 Negeri Sembilan state election, the BN-PN alliance formed the government with a two-thirds majority after winning 25 of the 36 seats.
“Discuss it properly. We managed to find a solution in Negeri Sembilan, so surely we can do the same in Malacca,” he said.
BN leads the governments of Johor and Malacca, as well as coalition administrations in Perak and Pahang with Harapan and, most recently, Negeri Sembilan with PN.
PN governs the northern and east-coast states of Kedah, Perlis, Kelantan and Terengganu.
Constraints
Commenting on BN’s position in the Madani government, Razlan, who is also one of Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s political secretaries, claimed BN ministers were “constrained” and not given complete freedom.
“There are many (constraints)... but I took an oath as a political secretary, so I cannot disclose those matters.
“There are many things we cannot do in terms of development and agencies.
“Take Felda, for example...(PKR Youth chief) Kamil Abdul Munim said Felda is under Zahid, while the prime minister said he oversees Felda. That is one example,” he added. - Mkini
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.