Bukit Jelutong MP Jeff Ooi says today it is no longer possible to work with PAS after the Islamist party tabled the Kelantan Shariah Criminal Code II Enactment 1993 amendment yesterday. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Hasnoor Hussain, March 19, 2015.
In the clearest sign yet that the Pakatan Rakyat coalition is breaking up, a Penang DAP lawmaker urged the coalition to suspend all forms of collaboration and cooperation with PAS at all levels.
Bukit Jelutong MP Jeff Ooi said ties must be cut off from the state government to state excos' aides, local government, village development and security committee, state constituency coordinators, all the way to the national party leadership level.
The call comes after the Islamist party tabled the Kelantan Shariah Criminal Code II Enactment 1993 amendment yesterday.
"PAS national has betrayed us. We don't and cannot trust them any more," he said today.
Ooi also said DAP should not delay its censure against the PAS leadership or take sides to lend moral support to the pleadings from the so-called "liberal group" in the Islamist party.
Ooi said DAP, too, should not be seen as meddling in the process of PAS's party elections in June.
He said everyone must be clear that hudud was not a Kelantan PAS policy but a national policy, which meant a total betrayal on the part of the Islamist party.
He said PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang had not said a word about the issue and his silence condoned the tabling of the hudud bill.
"PAS grassroots and leadership must put their house in order, tend to their own internal problems and political direction. PAS is either with us or against us, Pakatan Rakyat.
"The DAP central working committee must make a decisive stand against PAS when it convenes next Monday.”
Ooi reminded his party to invoke the spirit and thoughts of its late chairman, Karpal Singh, the Tiger of Jelutong, in the face of this betrayal.
"Remember where Karpal positioned DAP on this issue... and send out the righteous and firm signals to PAS that its act of betrayal against PR is in an unholy manner."
Ooi, a vocal two-term MP, said the hudud bill in Kelantan, if passed, would be extended to other states.
"There is 'udang di sebalik batu' (ulterior motives)."
PR-controlled Selangor would be the immediate target, he said, as PAS has 15 state seats out of the total 43.
He said if PAS combined with the 12 assemblymen from Umno and the sole independent former Selangor Menteri Besar Tan Sri Abdul Khalid Ibrahim, they would have 28 reps against PKR's 13 reps and DAP's 15, and destabilise PR.
"The immediate objective of PAS is to facilitate a unity government made up of Umno and PAS in Selangor. The unity government element has surfaced in a crystal-clear manner.
"It is a strategic move. By forming a unity government, PAS and Umno will destabilise PR. Selangor is the first target and next is the PR coalition.”
Ooi said after tabling the hudud bill at the state legislative assembly, PAS would table a private member’s bill in parliament to push its hudud agenda.
He said it was a partisan strategy that would polarise non-Muslims.
He also cited how Kelantan Deputy Menteri Besar Datuk Mohd Amar Nik Abdullah had said they could succeed in getting a simple majority in Parliament to support the bill.
"That is a clear threat to non-Muslims.
"There will also be clarion calls by pro-hudud activists and non-government organisations to adopt and enforce hudud nationwide in the light of advancement of extreme Muslim Brotherhood in the name of the Islamic State (Isis militant group)," he said.
Ooi also hit out at BN component parties, calling Kelantan Umno's full force support of the state's hudud bill appalling.
He took BN's non-Muslim parties MCA and Gerakan to task for not stopping Umno from doing so.
"No need to do 'wayang Cina' (Chinese opera) with your legal action against PAS. You are senior partners in BN. Couldn't you do something to stop Umno?"
At the end of his press conference, Ooi confirmed what he meant about suspending ties with PAS when asked by reporters, remarking: "Yes. We cannot trust PAS any more."
"To move forward, we must have trust. If you have someone stabbing you in the back, then I say with friends like that, you don't need enemies.”
Yesterday, national organising secretary Anthony Loke had said DAP would review its place in Pakatan Rakyat (PR) following Kelantan PAS's move to table a bill on hudud.
He reiterated that the Islamic penal code was never part of the pact's common policy and the move to proceed with its tabling was a "betrayal" of the consensus reached at PR's presidential council meeting.
- TMI
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