Zulhaidah bt Suboh

The allocation of seats in the opposition coalition involving Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) is almost completed except in a few states such as Perak and Penang, said PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim.

“The allocation of seats in most states is virtually settled, just one or two seats which have not been finalised such as two seats in Perak and one in Penang which require further discussion.

“In Kedah, from the 40 parliamentary and state seats, maybe only one or two have not been decided. This means the progress is very good,” he told a press conference after launching the Terengganu PKR general election machinery in Kuala Terengganu today. Also present was Terengganu PKR chairman Azan Ismail.

On allegations by certain quarters that the leaders of PAS and PKR were not as close as before, Anwar said he did not agree with the opinion.

He said all meetings went smoothly as scheduled and no problems had arisen.

“My relations with Tok Guru Nik Aziz (PAS spiritual leader) and Tuan Guru Abdul Hadi (PAS president) is closer than before,” he said.

On PKR Terengganu which was only allocated seven seats comprising two parliamentary and five state seats when it wanted three parliamentary and 11 state seats for the coming general election, he said although PAS had the right to do so, the matter was still negotiable.

- Bernama

Salam kawan kawan.

Dalam musim bermaaf-maafan ini, saya nak ceritakan konspirasi peguam Umno tersohor, Shafee Abdullah, dengan penasihat media Jabatan Perdana Menteri, Jalil Hamid, dalam liputan kes liwat Anwar Ibrahim.

Walaupun falsampah politik saya tak selari dengan Anwar Ibrahim, saya sebagai wartawan Malaysia muak dengan konspirasi konspirasi untuk menggunakan media untuk menjatuhkan ahli politik.

Sudah lama dah. Dari zaman Utusan Melayu di ambil alih 1961 sampai sekarang. 50 tahun. Cukuplah Umno dan Umno Baru. Sedarlah sikit.

Konspirasi yang terbaru ni sama seperti konspirasi memburukkan Raja Petra Kamarudin beberapa tahun dulu.

Kira-kira dua minggu yang lalu, Shafee Abdullah dan Jalil Hamid, yang baru ini kena kutuk pasal pelannya memburukkan Bersih 2.0, telah berjumpa pengarang kanan media tempatan untuk cara-cara meliputi kes liwat Anwar Ibrahim.

Mereka mengutuk pendakwaraya yang tidak membantah ucapan politik Anwar Ibrahim pada permulaan pembelaannya dalam kes liwat aduan Saiful Bukhari Azlan. Yalah, Anwar Ibrahim berucap mengutuk kerajaan dan apa yang dia panggil konspirasi terhadapnya.

Pendakwaraya diam sahaja. Tidak membantah dan membenarkan dia bercakap.

Shafee Abdullah tidak tahan lagi. Walaupun dia tidak ada hak atau kepentingan dalam kes ini kecuali untuk anak guamnya Umno, dia terus memanggil pengarang-pengarang kanan untuk satu mesyuarat.

Dan sebelahnya, penasihat media Perdana Menteri, Jalil Hamid. Dulu orang Bernama, lepas tu Reuters, lepas tu Suruhanjaya Sekuriti. Sekarang bertempat di National Communications Team di Mid Valley. Ini semua maklumat yang dari sumber-sumber sahih seperti A. Kadir Jasin, yang dulu penasihat Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Kira Goebbels Senior dan Goebbels Junior lah.

Dalam mesyuarat yang diadakan di Le Meridien Hotel, Shafee memberitahu dan mengarahkan pengarang-pengarang kanan media tempatan cara-cara dan isu-isu yang patut di utarakan dalam media masing-masing. Yalah, cara nak mencerca dan mengutuk Anwar Ibrahim.

Antara yang dalam mesyuarat itu adalah si penemuramah Raja Petra Kamarudin dari TV3. Yang bergelar Datuk. Yang sekarang ini terjebak dalah kes gangguan seksual. Ini kuasa Allah. You burukkan orang, you kena nanti.

Tapi saya nak tanya. Apa kuasa Shafee Abdullah dalam kes ini. Apa peranan Jalil Hamid dalam kes ini. Mengapa mereka ada kuasa memanggil pengarang-pengarang kanan dan memberitahu mereka apa yang patut di buat dalam liputan kes liwat Anwar Ibrahim.

Adakah duit rakyat digunakan dalam konspirasi ini? Macam mana kita nak percaya media arus perdana kalau ada mesyuarat macam ini dan konspirasi ini. Rakyat dah bosan dengan taktik taktik kotor.

Wahai Perdana Menteri Putrajaya, tuan tahu tak pasal konspirasi ini? Tuan terlibat kah dalam konspirasi ini? Bukan boleh percaya media arus perdana ini, tuan. Dia akan makan tuannya nanti.

Jadi kawan kawan, jangan percaya langsung berita arus perdana mengenai kes liwat Anwar Ibrahim. Mereka telah diarahkan untuk membohong lebih lagi supaya Anwar Ibrahim tidak berjaya tawan Putrajaya.

Saya tidak kira siapa jadi kerajaan. Tapi saya tidak suka orang bohong. Saya tidak suka Shafee Abdullah dan Jalil Hamid boleh sewenang wenangnya bagitau boss saya apa yang dia patut buat. Ini salah.

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5 Defectors from BN Sarawak? We know of 3 from our sources in BN.!!

A leader of a component party within the Sarawak Barisan Nasional (BN) today revealed that five MPs from Sarawak were prepared to defect to the opposition before or on Sept 16, 2008, in support of Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim’s plan to take over the federal government.

The leader, who requested anonymity, told FMT: “I was directed by an Umno leader to contact 10 MPs from PBB, SUPP, PRS and SPDP to defect to the opposition.

“Five of the MPs agreed to jump ship on condition that an Umno leader would be appointed as the interim prime minister to replace (premier) Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.”

The leader was responding to a WikiLeaks report which said that Anwar’s plan to take over Putrajaya, with the support of BN legislators, was real.

“Five more were interested, but they wanted to wait and see before making any decision,” the BN leader said, adding that there were several BN parliamentarians who had been unhappy with Abdullah.

“I had a number of meetings with the Umno leader, who told me that Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah would be appointed as the interim prime minister in the unity government for the next two or three years.

“Anwar would be appointed as deputy prime minister,” he said.

According to him, the Umno leader claimed that apart from Sarawak MPs, the plan had also received the support of MPs from Sabah and other states.

‘My job to explain our policies’
However, the plan failed to materialise as some Umno MPs who were considering defecting had leaked the plan to the then prime minister.

Two weeks or so before the Sept 16 deadline set by the opposition to form the new government, about 40 MPs, mostly from Sabah and Sarawak, were sent by the BN backbenchers club to Taiwan to “study” agriculture.

The move derailed Anwar’s plan.

Using this “failed” attempt, BN went all out to demonise Anwar including calling him a great “liar”.

WikiLeaks last week quoted former Sabah chief minister Salleh Said Keruak as saying that more than half of the 25 MPs from Sabah were ready to abandon BN and join the opposition.

However, Salleh denied the story.

Said Anwar: “I don’t want to comment on the issue of Sept 16 anymore. You have seen how many MPs were transported to study agriculture in Taiwan.

“My focus now is to turn Pakatan Rakyat into a formidable force.

“They can attack me in the court, they can attack Mat Sabu (deputy president of PAS) and Lim Kit Siang, (DAP national adviser), but our job is to explain our policies to the people.

“We want to win the next general election,” Anwar said.

Free Malaysia Today

Selangor has pledged to channel its resources, including manpower, to help Sarawak in the coming general election as it is one of the important states that can ensure the Pakatan Rakyat ‘march’ to Putrajaya is successful.

Selangor Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim, who was here on a visit together with de facto PKR leader Anwar Ibrahim, said people were begining to accept Pakatan.

“As the people are now beginning to understand our policies and our struggle, the Pakatan Rakyat will mount a very serious challenge against the Barisan Nasional government.

“It is possible for us to go to Putrajaya with strong support coming from Johor, Sarawak, Sabah and other states.

“Sarawak is important to us. This is why we have to send our manpower and resources to Sarawak,” he told a press conference yesterday.

Khalid and Anwar were in Kuching for a meeting with state PKR leaders.

Khalid called on Sarawak PKR leaders, members and supporters to work hard and to go to the ground and mix with the people.

“You must explain our policies, our struggle and our pledge to the people.

“The more they understand our struggle, the brighter the chance for us to win over their hearts and minds,” he said.

Not easy
He admitted, however, that it is not easy to organise things in the state especially if it has to do with Anwar.

“Many people are scared of political backlash or that they are being threatened if they show open support for us.

“Let me remind Sarawak leaders that if they continue to do this, we from Selangor can also do the same that is, banning them from entering the state or refusing them from using our facilities.

“But Selangor will not do it. They can use our halls and other facilities because these facilities are built using people’s money.

“However, they must follow rules and regulations.

“Tell Sarawak leaders not to be arrogant and give the people the opportunity to choose between BN and Pakatan.

“I feel sad that Sarawak is so rich with natural resources, but the people have no chance to enjoy those benefits.

“That is why I dare to say that we will work together with the people to plan a better future for the people of the state,” he said.

Later in the afternoon Khalid left for Miri to meet with party leaders and members, while Anwar met with members of the state leadership council.

Later Anwar left for a Bidayuh village in the Mambong constituency, which is one of the 15 seats that PKR has expressed its interest to contest.

Seat allocations

Meanwhile, See Chee How, vice-chairman of Sarawak PKR, said that a formal meeting with DAP and PAS will be held in Kuching this month on seat allocation.

He said that the three component parties of Pakatan Rakyat had several informal discussions on the seat allocation, but he could not give details.

“The first stage is for all the three parties to list out all the desired seats. Then we know which seats are overlapping and which are not.

“And judging from our ground activities, one can guess which are the seats that are overlapping,” he said.

He added that even if both DAP and PKR were involved in the same constituency, it will not become an issue since ground activity is vital for Pakatan to win the seat.

Most of the 15 seats that PKR is targeting are rural or semi-urban constituencies. DAP on the other hand has expressed its interest to contest between 10 and 12 seats, six of which are Chinese majority constituencies.

PAS has not revealed the number of seats it wants to contest. Sarawak has 31 parliamentary seats.
Of these, two – Bandar Kuching and Sibu – are held by DAP.

Free Malaysia Today

A leaked US embassy cable has lent credence to Pakatan Rakyat leader Anwar Ibrahim’s claim that a group of Sabah and Sarawak politicians had planned to defect from the BN on Sept 16, 2008, over the marginalisation of the two states.

An entry in the cable, posted by Wikileaks, Sabah former Chief Minister Salleh Said Keruak had told US embassy officials that potentially more than half of the 25 Sabah MPs were ready to abandon the BN, following the precedent set by the SAPP.

The cable claimed further that embassy officials found “no expressions of support” for Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s leadership among the senior Sabah politicians held a series of meetings from June 18-20 in that state that year.

“Matter-of-factly, Salleh stated that between (eight) and 14 BN MPs (out of Sabah’s 25 seats) would leave the BN, naming (five) from Umno and (four) from Upko, in addition to (two) from Sapp,” the cable, dated June 24, 2008, read.

This is the first time a source outside of Pakatan has lent any legitimacy to Anwar’s Malaysia Day claims, which eventually turned out to be a dud despite months spent declaring that the opposition would take over the federal administration on the symbolic date.

Talk of the purported defections were not helped by a “study tour” in Taiwan organised by the BN backbenchers club (BNBBC) – consisting largely of MPs from Sabah and Sarawak – in the weeks before Sept 16, with claims that it was to block attempts to woo the MPs over to the other side.

The situation became even more suspect when a five-member team from PKR followed suit a few days later, with vice-president Tian Chua – then the publicity chief – confirming that they would be meeting “some MPs” to rethink their positions in the BN.

BNBBC chief and Bintulu MP Tiong King Sing, however, denied that the tour had any objectives outside the official line that they were there to learn about Taiwan’s agriculture industry.

Loathing Abdullah, distrusting Anwar
The cable, marked confidential, however, stressed that while senior Sabah politicians were unanimous in their disgruntlement over Abdullah’s (right) leadership, they at the same time had little support for Anwar.

This appeared to be the case across political lines, with old wounds clearly still raw over Anwar’s purported role in the toppling of the PBS state government in 1994 when he was deputy prime minister in Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s administration.

The cable said Salleh, described as an “Umno warlord”, and Sapp president Yong Teck Lee – also a former chief minister – had both pointed out Anwar’s popularity in Sabah, especially among local Malays, but stated little else in terms of support for the former Umno stalwart.

PBS president Joseph Pairin Kitingan, a direct casualty of his party’s downfall in 1994 from a string of defections to BN, made his stand clear against Anwar, who he described as someone who “is only interested in becoming prime minister”, as quoted in the cable.

More intriguingly, however, is the alleged statement of the then-state DAP chief and current Kota Kinabalu MP Hiew King Cheu, who the cable quoted as “scornfully” saying; “why should anyone sacrifice for Anwar’s ambitions?”

The cable also cited discussions by “some Sabah politicians” of forming a third block outside of BN and Pakatan, with support – especially from DAP – for Umno veteran and former Semangat 46 chief Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah to lead a third parliamentary block incorporating “disaffected MPs” from Umno, East Malaysia and opposition parties PKR and DAP.

“Other politicians, including PBS leader Pairin, simply appeared to endorse DPM Najib taking over immediately from Abdullah,” the cable added, in reference to Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, who served as deputy premier during Abdullah’s term.

Defections needed to clean out EC
A separate cable, issued a month earlier on May 13 also classified as confidential, quoted the then PKR vice-president Azmin Ali as saying that some BN Parliamentarians were expected to announce their defections between May 17 and 18, describing it as an important move to avoid “manipulation” of the electoral rolls ahead of a planned by-election that eventually saw Anwar elected to Parliament.

The cable quoted Azmin, now the party’s deputy president, as claiming that the Election Commission would delay any by-election to the very end of the 60-day period to give BN and the commission time to “manipulate the electoral roll” and guarantee that Anwar would lose.

Azmin had apparently argued that it was better for the opposition to first take in BN defectors and form an interim government, before having a by-election to allow Anwar to contest and win a parliamentary seat.

“Once the Peoples’ Alliance (Pakatan) obtains the mandate to form the government, it will immediately oust the current Election Commission chairman, who is seen as able to block Anwar’s chances of becoming an MP,” the cable said.

The EC chief at the time was Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman, who served until his retirement in December, 2008 after overseeing seven general elections. He was succeeded by the then Home Ministry secretary-general Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof.

Malaysiakini