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Selangor Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim is no longer the PKR Selangor chief. The party’s vice-president Azmin Ali now is.
What that really means depends on the spin it’s given. The mainstream media has gone to town in painting it black, calling it a further split within the PKR leadership. Azmin, they say, is among a group of 15 PKR MPs who want to oust Khalid.
Online news websites, however, feel that Khalid can now devote his time and energy to leading the Selangor government which may be a good strategic move since strengthening the nation’s most industrialised state will be crucial to the outcome of the next general election.
Azmin claims he is not part of any conspiracy to do Khalid in and if he had wanted to do so, he could have done it right after the March 8 general election. Blogger Haris Ibrahim, however, thinks that Azmin “has long wanted to bring Khalid down… coveting the MB-ship of Selangor for himself”.
There’s certainly more to all this than meets the eye and the real truth to what is really happening will always be elusive. But what seems to emerge from this turn of events is that the dark side of human nature continues to prevail even within the ranks of a party that bases its struggle on the name of justice.
Khalid has been criticised for failing to do numerous things but the biggest offence he has committed, according to party insiders, is not awarding some of his critics lucrative contracts and positions in government. This cuts right to the bone of the issue. It’s still about personal gratification. It shows that some PKR politicians are in it for the money, not public service.
If you had thought this was Umno territory, alien to PKR, you would be wrong. PKR is seemingly not averse to cronyism, despite their protestations against it and their promises to eliminate it once they came into office.
Perhaps this is so because many in their ranks came from Umno and, like leopards, cannot change their spots. Nonetheless, it doesn’t look good in the public eye. It negates whatever noble intentions are being harboured by those PKR members who are committed to the party’s avowed principles. And there are quite a number among them, including elected representatives.
Besides, it compounds the many upheavals that have been taking place within PKR over the past year. Defections and internal conflicts have rocked the party and rendered it arguably the weakest among the partners in Pakatan Rakyat. After March 8, it led the Opposition by dint of its numerical strength of 31 seats in Parliament, but now that has sadly dwindled to 24, just one seat more than PAS, and four fewer than DAP.
If PKR does not get its house in order, it may have a tough time winning over voters at the next general election. As it is, the current public perception is that the party appears to be too much in disarray to indicate it can form a viable government, even with its Pakatan partners. The need to change this perception is undoubtedly urgent.
PKR supreme council member Zaid Ibrahim recently called on the party’s de facto leader, Anwar Ibrahim, to sack the group of 15MPs allegedly conspiring against Khalid. He said, “Selangor is all we’ve got and our priority should be safeguarding it.”
Although the proposition sounds drastic, he is quite right to present it. A massive spring cleaning of the party may indeed be necessary to win it the public’s respect, and if PKR does not embark on it soon or find alternative ways of addressing its rifts, it may be too late for the next general election. It could then hand victory to Umno and Barisan Nasional by default because of a loss of faith by the public.
Many voters were heartened by the hope after March 8 that PKR and Pakatan Rakyat would grow in strength and help bring about positive change, but that hope is starting to fade. Something needs to be done urgently to resuscitate it.
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