By Shannon Teoh

July 05, 2010

Pakatan Rakyat leaders attend the launch of FoPR in London yesterday, July 4, 2010. — Picture by Danny Lim

LONDON, July 5 — Pakatan Rakyat (PR) leaders continued their bullish stance towards a possible snap election by insisting that they would win big, when launching an outreach programme here yesterday.

Despite losing five MPs this year, they further taunted Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak by stating that the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition was running scared.

“Umno is in a state of panic. They see enemies everywhere,” PR secretariat chief Datuk Zaid Ibrahim told a crowd of over 200 at the launch of Friends of Pakatan Rakyat (FoPR) in London.

Other leaders at the FoPR launch, such as PAS treasurer Dr Mohd Hatta Ramli, DAP’s Kepong MP Dr Tan Seng Giaw and Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah Anwar, were also confident of expanding their historic wins in Election 2008 into the next general election, which must be held by 2013.

Their upbeat mood followed Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s statement last week that PR would be ready should BN opt to dissolve Parliament early.

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Danny Lim
Jul 5, 10
3:23pm

As rumours of a snap general election intensify, Pakatan Rakyat is taking its fight overseas with the launch of their Friends for Pakatan Rakyat (FoPR) club in London yesterday.

FoPR chairperson Brain Morais estimated that 20,000-30,000 Malaysians live in London alone.

They represent a potential political support group that could channel its energies and resources through the club.

For the launch, Pakatan top guns flew in from Malaysia to massage the morale of overseas supporters and run through a lengthy checklist of BN blemishes, whilst allaying concerns about problems within the coalition, during a five-hour wide-ranging forum.

Above all, the message was to exude confidence in Pakatan’s ability to win the next general election, adding that the Sibu by-election was the precursor to BN’s downfall.

PKR supreme council member Zaid Ibrahim (right) said this has led to a situation where BN would attack imaginary enemies or create dodgy excuses to taint rivals.

Among others, he cited the banning of cartoon books by Zulkiflee Anwar Ulhaque, better known as Zunar, and attempts to taint his Manchester rendevous with fugitive blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin as a criminal act.

“(BN) are in a state of panic, they now see enemies everywhere,” said Zaid, who later stated confidently that Pakatan’s takeover of Putrajaya is inevitable and near.

Withholding dissolution

As the cheerleading baton passed on to PAS treasurer Hatta Ramli, he said BN bigwigs such as Umno vice-president Hishammuddin Hussein have dropped wide hints that a general election is looming.

“Which is September I guess. If it is, I think we will win big,” said Hatta (left).

He then mooted the possibility of Pakatan-held states of Kelantan, Kedah, Penang and Selangor choosing not to dissolve their respective state legislative assemblies as a tactical manoeuvre.

“I’m trying to persuade our leaders…. I hope, or we hope, that the states now controlled by Pakatan will not join the fray and will not dissolve out state assembly.

“We have a duty to do. We have been given the task to rule for five years. We cannot run away from our responsibilities,” he said.

Hatta said that should a snap election be called, this scenario will allow Pakatan to concentrate its efforts on capturing other states, particularly the “difficult” states of Johor, Sabah and Malacca.

BN’s only innovation

The final speaker, Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah Anwar, took a more nuanced perspective and invited her audience to appreciate the fact that unlike the BN, Pakatan is open to criticism and willing to improve itself.

“You shouldn’t choose Pakatan just because we are the antithesis to BN. We have our weaknesses, but we have also been making progress,” she said.

Eager to quote policy positions, she cited successes like the implementation of Selangor Select Committee on Competency, Accountability and Transparency which acts as a internal check-and-balance mechanism.

“(Pakatan) distinguishes the power of the state, the state assembly and the powers of the executive,” said Nurul Izzah, adding that with the BN, the lines are opaque.

Nurul Izzah (left) also took a jibe at Umno’s apparent attempts to “outsource” its racial agenda to controversial Malay rights advocate Perkasa.

“In the 10th Malaysia plan, innovation is said to be the main driver of economic growth. The only innovation (thus far) seems to be Perkasa,” she quipped.

“Ibrahim Ali… he is a creature who has to be avoided at all cost… The prime minister has allowed the voice of these narcissistic, narrow-minded, dangerous Malays and allowed (Dr) Mahathir (Mohamad) to back them up, to shore up support, supposedly for Umno, at what cost?”

Other personalities at the event were fugitive blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin, private investigator in exile P Balasubramaniam (in red shirt), and Tumpat MP Kamaruddin Jaafar.

The event was held at the Conway Hall, which is reputed as a hub for free speech and previously a platform for speakers such as author Salman Rushdie.

For Pakatan, the cost of flying its leaders to London will be far outweighed by the votes it can achieve, if FoPR can get even half as many Malaysian Londoners to make the trip back home.

DANNY LIM is a freelance writer and photographer currently based in the UK.

Malaysiakini

Joe Fernandez
Jun 6, 10
1:18pm

COMMENT There seems to be some new method at work in Jeffrey Gapari Kitingan’s “madness” judging from the unexpected presence of Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah Anwar in Kota Kinabalu for the weekend. It was close to midnight on Thursday when invitations for a Tadau Ka’amatan (Harvest Festival) dinner function, the next day in her honour, went out. 

Putatan PKR Division Chief, Awang Ahmad Shah, who made all the dinner arrangements, could not shed any light on the hurried function. All that the longtime Jeffrey ally and political scientist could say was that he was merely “carrying out instructions”. 

Officially, the word is that Nurul (right) was on a brief holiday in Sabah with her husband and two kids and visiting friends. Jeffrey’s off-the-cuff speech during the dinner and that of Nurul and several other Pakatan Rakyat leaders told a different story: that politics, as the first German Chancellor Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck remarked on Aug 11, 1867, is all about “the art of the possible”. 

The Sabah strongman had evidently invited the Puteri Reformasi (Reformation Princess), in a moment of eureka, to be the new face of the Pakatan Youth in Sabah and Sarawak. Her mission, should she so choose, is to help woo the votes of the young, and perhaps the not so young, to the opposition alliance. This includes an estimated 280,000 unregistered eligible young voters – in Sabah alone – and women. This is a sizeable chunk of the vote bank in East Malaysia. 

The youth factor can be expected to put a dent in Barisan Nasional’s perennial boast that Sabah, along with neighbouring Sarawak, are electoral fixed deposits of the ruling coalition. Jeffrey sees BN’s bragging as a form of calculated insult to the people of the two states.

East Malaysians not stupid

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Abdul Rahim Sabri
Jun 3, 10 2:44pm

Malaysiakini

Perdana Menteri Datuk Seri Najib Razak sekali lagi dipelawa untuk menyertai meja bulat untuk membincangkan isu serangan Israel terhadap kapal yang membawa bantuan kemanusian ke Gaza Isnin lalu.

Meja bulat anjuran Pakatan itu akan berlangsung di Kelab Sultan Sulaiman, Kampung Baru di ibunegara mulai jam 11 pagi esok.

Pelawaan tersebut dibuat oleh ahli parlimen Lembah Pantai, Nurul Izzah Anwar dalam satu sidang akhbar di ibunegara hari ini.

Perbincangan tersebut akan disertai Ketua Pembangkang, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, Presiden PAS, Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang dan pemimpin veteran DAP Lim Kit Siang.

Mereka akan bercakap atas tajuk “Keamanan dan Keadilan untuk Gaza”.

“Ia (supaya) dilihat kebersamaan menentang isu ini kerana ia melibatkan isu ummah bukannya isu kepartian,” katanya.
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Malaysiakini

Abdul Rahim Sabri
Jun 3, 10
12:37pm

Wakil rakyat muda Pakatan Rakyat menuntut kerajaan menjalankan siasatan secara “terbuka dan telus” ke atas kematian seorang pegawai tadbir diplomatik (PTD) semasa latihan pada 31 Mei lalu.

Sekumpulan empat orang wakil rakyat itu juga turut mendesak upaya kerajaan membekukan penglibatan peserta dalam latihan seumpamanya sehingga siasatan dijalankan sepenuhnya.

Ahli parlimen Lembah Pantai Nurul Izzah Anwar berkata pihak berwajib tiada pilihan selain “mendasari isu ini dengan teliti” dan menjamin tiada lagi kejadian seumpamanya berlaku.

“Pihak berkenaan harus bekukan penglibatan peserta di dalam latihan seumpanaya sehingga ia disiasat sepenuhnya dengan yelus dan terbuka,” kata Nurul Izzah yang membacakan satu kenyataan.

“Sekiranya latihan dikendalikan oleh perunding, adakah perunding ini mempunyai latar belakang profesional,” soalnya.

Dalam insiden itu, mangsa Norhashimah Wahid, 31, meninggal dunia di Unit Rawatan Rapi (ICU) Hospital Tengku Ampuan Rahimah, Klang selepas mengikuti kursus ala komando di Jugra, Kuala Langat.

Beliau yang berkhidmat dengan Kementerian Kewangan di Putrajaya, difahamkan mengikuti kursus Modul Jati Diri di sebuah kawasan hutan yang dikendalikan oleh Pasukan Khas Tentera Udara (PASKAU).

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Malaysian Digest

KUALA LUMPUR, 3 JUNE, 2010: Lembah Pantai MP, Nurul Izzah Anwar, urged the federal government and the Public Service Department (JPA) to carry out a thorough open investigation into the recent death of a PTD officer, to determine if it was due to negligence.

Nurul, in a press conference held at her office this morning, said that the death of 31-year old Finance Ministry’s PTD officer Norhashimah Wahid, after undergoing a ‘commando-style’ training module, is both “disturbing and regrettable”.

She expressed her disappointment with the response from the Finance Ministry which has refused o bear responsibility over Norhashimah’s death.

“What are the criteria set for companies to manage the

training?” asked Nurul Izzah during the press conference.

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