Kit Siang confusing 'majority rules' with 'consensus', says PAS man

A senior PAS leader today accused DAP stalwart Lim Kit Siang of confusing the "consensus principle" adopted by the defunct Pakatan Rakyat coalition with a "majority rules" principle.

PAS Dewan Ulama information chief Khairuddin Aman Razali said Pakatan Rakyat's consensus principle required a unanimous agreement from all three member parties.

On the other hand, he said a majority rules principle would compel one party to follow the other two parties.

"For Lim and his ilk, not agreeing with the majority is tantamount to breaching the consensus. He (Lim) is confused between the majority and consensus principle," he said.

Khairuddin said only matters which had been unanimously agreed upon could be treated as the Pakatan Rakyat agenda.

As such, Khairuddin said Lim had again slandered PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang by claiming that the latter had violated Pakatan Rakyat's consensus principle and caused the coalition's demise.

"(The) DAP and PKR are the ones clearly guilty of breaking up Pakatan Rakyat. (But) they are using the PAS president as an excuse to cover up their mistakes.

"Now, the old story is being repeated. With hope that the people will not be smart enough to understand their dirty political games,” said Khairuddin in a statement today.

The Kajang move

He said the consensus principle did not prevent any party from voicing their disagreement or compel any party to agree with the majority decision.

Recounting the chain of events surrounding PKR's attempts to remove former Selangor menteri besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim, Khairuddin said that Abdul Hadi's objections at the time was not tantamount to breaching the consensus principle.

"(And) when PAS disagreed (with PKR and DAP) to submit only one name (to Selangor Sultan) as candidate for MB, that is also not going against the consensus.

"That is the right of every member under the consensus principle. There is no compulsion to follow the majority decision," he said.

In defending Abdul Hadi, Khairuddin said both PKR and DAP were eventually forced to apologise to Selangor Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah, who in a royal decree had expressed unhappiness with both parties.

"This eventually proved that Abdul Hadi had taken the right stand.

"It was proven that both DAP and PKR were too quick and careless in executing their moves, to the point where they were forced to admit their mistakes and apologise," he said in reference to events in 2014 which eventually led to PKR deputy president Azmin Ali replacing Abdul Khalid as menteri besar.

'DAP and PKR will not change'

This episode, said Khairuddin, was proof that DAP and PKR had repeatedly violated Pakatan Rakyat's consensus principle by implementing decisions without accounting for PAS.

"This attitude of not respecting an agreement (consensus) is what had led to Pakatan Rakyat's break up. They (DAP and PKR) will forever be breaking any agreement," he said.

In June 18, 2015, DAP had "announced" that Pakatan Rakyat was no more following PAS' decision to cut ties with DAP.

Recently, Lim had offered to work together with Abdul Hadi should the latter share the same commitment towards combating kleptocracy.

However, Abdul Hadi rejected the offer on grounds that PAS will not be able to work with a party which was "against Islam".- Mkini