Soaring Najib, sliding Umno

Najib Tun Razak has no suitable candidates in Selangor, can't unite his party in Terengganu and Sabah and is stuck with issues in Negeri Sembilan.

COMMENT

Many people hold the perception that when it comes to Selangor, despite Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak being the state liaison committee chairman, he doesn’t know what’s going on in Selangor.

Selangor is a case where there are too many cooks spoiling the broth. Let me list them out.

Mohamad Zin aka “Zin Badak” is the Selangor Umno liasion secretary, who hails from Malacca. He can’t dream of becoming the menteri besar (MB).

Selangor Umno deputy liaison chief Noh Omar is embroiled in so many personal issues with the other Selangor warlords that he will be stopped in his tracks en route to becoming MB.

The other warlord, Satim Diman (current opposition chief in the Selangor State Legislative Assembly) can’t be considered a winnable candidate as he has been proven to be behind many dubious land transactions.

In which case who can take over as MB for the opposition BN camp?

Where will Najib find a suitable candidate,who hails from Selangor to head the state?.

There seems to be none.

Had FD Mansor Iskandar, the man leading the Glomac property development, been born in Selangor, then he would be considered a winnable candidate.

This aside, Najib has also proven to be totally ignorant of the groundswell among Malay Selangorians disgruntled at the overwhelming Java-nising of Selangor Umno.

Hence it’s true, like what the Oracle of Syed Putera (the alter ego of Daim Zainuddin) told me some time ago, as far as Selangor goes, Najib isn’t aware of what is really going on.

Najib’s war cry

As such I am somewhat amused at Najib’s war cry that he is confident of getting back the states now under the opposition.

But here’s the thing: in an exclusive interview with Chinese daily Nanyang Siang Pau recently, Daim said the Umno-BN coalition was only safe in three states – Johor, Malacca and Pahang.

He said the the key to recapturing Kedah and Selangor from Pakatan Rakyat would be to find suitable leadership line-ups in those states.

And Daim believed that to keep Terengganu and Sabah, a united Umno is essential, while retaining Perak will be an uphill battle for BN.

As for Negeri Sembilan, he said BN must resolve specific problems if it is to rule.

Such was his prophercy. Meanwhile, even as Najib’s personal ratings soar, Umno’s is running south.
The fact is Umno can no longer save itself. Everyday Umno is showing its frailty.

Najib is telling the rakyat not to make the same “mistake” again.

He is right. The rakyat should not make the same mistake of giving Umno and its leadership the licence to rob and plunder the country again.

Its obvious that neither Najib nor Umno has respect for the people’s choice. It’s obvious that Najib is not a democrat but a closet feudalist.

Umno is clueless

Why, you may ask? Because the “mistake” that Najib is asking the people not to make is the 51% popularity vote which the voters gave Pakatan Rakyat in the peninsula in the 2008 polls. Unmo received 49% of votes.

What saved Umno and allowed Najib to become prime minister was the electoral boundaries. If not for this “arrangement”, Umno would be long gone.

On that note allow me to share the views of blogger Walla on what you should do when Umno talks to you.

“If Umno tells you the opposition only makes empty promises, hold Umno to it. Tell Umno to distribute more federal funds to Pakatan-run states so that the voters can see if those state governments will be doing any less than Umno-held state governments for the rakyat. Then come talk.

“In fact, the Umno general members should vote for the opposition wherever they be so that Umno can be put to sit in the opposition bench for one term in order to finalise the list of mistakes it should be apologising for.

“With what it has been showing all this while, it is only pretending to be sincere, or worse, it doesn’t seem to know.”

The writer is a former Umno state assemblyman but joined DAP earlier this year. He is a FMT columnist.