WHILST it is good, in retrospect, for the Pakatan Harapan (PH) leadership to realise that there is a need for political reset and implement reformation within our coalition, more has to be said about the political landscape in the country.
The fact remains that we cannot be deluded by new jargons. PH has given the mandate to Anwar to negotiate and reset with all parties without prejudices. Only credible and respected leaders can undertake this challenging task.
At this critical juncture, PH needs to work even with the conservatives, besides harnessing all the progressive forces to save this country. It’s time for all politicians to drop the ‘holier than thou’ attitude for greater unity and harmony of all Malaysians.
And two points must not be forgotten.
First, we must not forget that the success of PH as a credible front since 1998 to take over Putrajaya for 22 months from the kleptocrats has, all this while, been based on the Reformasi movement whipped up by Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
The injustices done to Anwar were the main reason why people rallied behind PH. Even Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and people like Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali and Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin took a ride on the crest, and despite being aware of it, Anwar was still willing to cooperate with the former prime minister for the larger interest of the rakyat.
It is not strange that Anwar, having read biographies of many great statesmen while in prison, decided to take the stance of the late former South African president Nelson Mandela, who appointed his nemesis, Frederick de Clerk, as deputy president II.
Anwar, in my perception, has been on the reconciliatory mode to try to bring the nation together. In fact, with the blessings from the coalition, while he was trying hard to garner support from other disgruntled MPs, let us not forget that the other side may not have been that serious about the political reset.
And, as PH, we must be aware that there is – and always has been – a concerted campaign that a still powerful former coalition – at least financially – is able to whip up against PH. It is all self-interest at the end of the day.
Therefore, PH should be all the more united as we have always been through the years. Let us not allow the “tok dalang” to put a wedge between all the partners, but instead attract more to join us if they want to work together. One can only accept their genuineness based on face value and, in the process, we know who has played us out during the Sheraton Move.
The second point is this – a political reset can be done internally within the PH coalition. However, unless there is a political reset in overall political landscape, we will still be back to square one.
The country will continue to regress when there are political leaders still trying to escape the long hands of the law. We have already seen in two cases how the Attorney-General’s Office could have pursued the cases more aggressively, but they were not.
In my opinion, a political reset can only help save the nation if it is also implemented by the parties that call themselves Perikatan Nasional, Muafakat Nasional and Barisan Nasional.
This pressure will have to come from the general populace, and their votes will ultimately set the tune to which the political leaders in this country will have to dance.
Malaysia can only be saved by a pluralistic leader – as we have seen how apartheid policies have divided South Africa and “white privilege” policies have divided the United States. Both policies have failed and we need a prime minister for all.
Let us put the interest of the ordinary rakyat in our minds. – The Vibes, December 18, 2020
Ronnie Liu is Sg Pelek assemblyman. He is also DAP central executive committee member and Selangor DAP secretary
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