With PAS at a crossroads, a political shift may be in store - Yes between ICU and the Graveyard

PAS at the cross roads now is 100% true but not because of external forces but it’s their leadership own doing. They are now between a hard place and a very hard rock. They believed in fool’s gold and when the fool’s gold turns to dust, they panicked. Cannot have the cake and also eat it. Hope PH does not invite it back to their grouping and let PAS be on its own as it is a liability and no sane person is going to vote for the PAS moon and for sure 80% of PAS grassroots will not vote or back the present PAS leadership who they see as betraying the very ideas of inclusiveness of TGNA among all the races in Malaysia, The Non-Malays never going to vote for PAS moon also. So best is to keep them out and let them take out their frustration on UMBNO who betrayed their promised of RU355 Hudud to these PAS gold diggers.

 

PAS candidates in a 3 way contest is going to draw away 30% like-minded votes from BN-UMNO Malay vote bank and scared of the Non-Malay votes to the PH candidate. Non-Malay voters see BN-UMNO as untrustworthy as a party to safe guard the Non-Malays rights. 40% of UMNO members / voters are disgusted with UMNO’s Hudud RU355 dance with PAS, as they see Huduh threatening the very existence of multi-racialism and UMNO was always a nationalist party and never used religion as a vote grabber and left religion to PAS. This is the reason UMNO with BN have been ruling Malaysia with the Non-Malays and PAS have been a marginal religious party consigned to the fringes of the villages with no real influence over the majority of Muslim Malays. Leave the religion to PAS and get back to the Original UMNO, BN with UMNO as an anchor will start seeing the return of non-Muslim votes. Banish religion from schools and civil services into the suraus and mosques as they were there before the advent and rise of Anwar Ibrahim the Malaysian government when he started the influx of radical Islam  the civil service and schools. My advise watch out for Anwar Ibrahim and once PH in power hope he does not hijack the victory for his own ambition and destroy Malaysia second time around Malaysia. He tried once and got kicked out by PM Mahathir and he may try again.

 

With PAS at a crossroads, a political shift may be in store

After all, the Opposition bloc can very well see PAS’ grassroots strength, which is probably second only to Umno’s

COMMENT

With Umno having backed out of its commitment to help PAS’ struggle to strengthen the shariah courts, an opportunity has presented itself for the Islamic party to re-evaluate which parties they now want to work with.

There is an old Malay idiom which says, “Bersatu kita teguh, bercerai kita roboh” (United we stand, divided we fall.)

PAS, like any other political party, needs power to deliver on its promises. And it can’t do it on its own.

PAS was once part of the ruling coalition BN but was expelled following an internal dispute. PAS then lost Kelantan and had to wait more than 20 years to win back the state, which it still controls.

Philosopher George Santayama once said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

The recent PAS split which led to the birth of its splinter party Amanah is also well documented.

Amanah may not be as strong as PAS now but with the personalities in its ranks, it is definitely a threat.

PAS should be mindful that its members may be attracted to the tunes being sung by Amanah, which is PAS’ number one enemy, far worse than Umno.

It is worth noting that even the National Association of Settlers (Anak) president, Mazlan Aliman, once a rising star of PAS, has now aligned himself with Amanah.

Throw in Mohamad Sabu, Salahuddin Ayub and Ahmad Awang and it would not be surprising that Malays in general and some quarters in PAS would be swayed by these Amanah personalities. After all, they are familiar faces among PAS members.

Solid grassroots

PAS too must remember that Amanah now has the help of Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM) to garner support from the rural Malay community.

Incidentally, PAS’ latest bitter experience with Umno came at a time when PAS grassroots were urging the party to cut ties with PKR, a member of the Pakatan Harapan bloc. It is probably wiser for PAS to retain PKR as its ally.

After all, former PAS president the late Fadzil Noor was among PKR’s staunch supporters, having backed then PKR de facto chief Anwar Ibrahim since the day he was sacked as deputy prime minister and kicked out of Umno.

But it might take more grace for PAS to restore ties with DAP.

It was not so long ago that we saw Lim Kit Siang and Abdul Hadi Awang sharing the same stage. Would we see it again?

DAP has said that it will welcome PAS back into the Opposition coalition but my guess is it would take a more sincere and serious approach to court PAS for it to consider siding with Pakatan again.

DAP has been slamming PAS at almost every turn now although during their time in Pakatan Rakyat DAP had appeared to soften its stand on hudud.

Recently, a video of DAP in happier times with PAS has made its rounds on the internet showing DAP leaders lauding PAS and assuring DAP supporters that hudud should not be feared.

In this digital age, it would be hard for politicians to backtrack on their own words as almost everything is documented.

So, to blame PAS alone for the death of Pakatan Rakyat would be a serious understatement. For DAP, its image among the Malay community will be better if it has the humility to apologise and open a way for PAS to back the Opposition front.

After all, it’s not like the Opposition bloc cannot see PAS’ grassroots strength, which is probably second only to Umno’s.