Uncharted political waters
The waves are high in Parliament with rocky shoals threatening on all sides.
IF the Perikatan Nasional government were a ship, it would be sailing in angry waters. The political ocean is swirling with furious big waves, threatening to sink the
MV Perikatan.
The captain of the MV Perikatan,
Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, admitted on live television on Friday that some Perikatan MPS have retracted their support for him and “this has raised doubts about my legitimacy as the PM and that of the Perikatan government”.
The waves have relentlessly attacked the MV Perikatan since the mutiny of 15 of its crew members (Umno MPS). The remaining 23 Umno MPS have decided to sink or swim with Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia president Muhyiddin.
The ideal situation to prevent the
MV Perikatan from becoming a shipwreck is to hang on to the ship, which has at least 115 crew members (MPS), and swap the captain with someone else, possibly from Umno.
But an Umno insider, who is with the faction against Muhyiddin, said, “That ship has sailed”. The Umno anti-muhyiddin faction is adamant
it wants to sink the MV Perikatan.
With 15 Umno MPS declaring that they no longer support Muhyiddin, the Prime Minister has about 100 MPS out of 220 MPS in the Dewan Rakyat behind him.
This means the Pagoh MP has lost his majority unless he can shore it up with Opposition MPS. But the Perikatan government has scraped the barrel in getting individual MPS to support it.
That’s why, on Friday, the Prime Minister invited political party leaders to come on board to discuss the list of proposals that the government will implement should the vote of confidence in his premiership scheduled for next month be passed.
Since his offer, some Opposition MPS have found themselves caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.
DAP, led by secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, tested the waters when two of its lawmakers – Damansara MP Tony Pua and Bangi MP Ong Kian Ming – argued on social media against accepting the offer.
Pua pointed out that Opposition leader and PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim does not command an adequate parliamentary majority to form the next government.
“(GE15 is) only 10 months away and I’m very certain and confident that the rakyat will kick out those who betrayed their mandate in 2018 and return the right coalition back into power then.
“That will be the sweetest of revenge,” he said, referring to the Prime Minister’s promise in his Friday speech to hold the 15th General Election by July 2022 at the latest.
But Pua and Ong’s arguments are minority views in their party. Their DAP comrades have an opposing view, and the pro-opposition social media bubble is furiously against Pua and Ong’s views.
On Friday night, all the Opposition parties (with MPS), including Umno (the faction against Muhyiddin), rejected the offer.
But there is suspicion that some Opposition parties or MPS are only pretending not to accept it.
“Quietly, they are arranging for enough of their MPS to support the PM when there is a confidence vote.
“The excuse they will use is that they don’t want the court cluster of Umno to return as Anwar doesn’t have the numbers to be PM, and they don’t want Parliament to be dissolved,” a Pakatan Harapan insider told me. (He’s referring to the Umno MPS facing various court cases.)
There is a possibility that an Opposition party with a court cluster had preliminary meetings to discuss a confidence and supply agreement before the Prime Minister announced it (a CSA is an arrangement in a hung Parliament in which an Opposition party or coalition agrees not to vote against a minority government in votes of confidence or budgetary matters but reserves the right to oppose other legislation).
So the MV Pakatan – a coalition comprising PKR, DAP and Amanah – could also face a mutiny.
Perikatan government coalition parties are also caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.
PAS deputy president Datuk Seri Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man is firm that the Islamist party will not accept DAP as part of a coalition government.
There is a big question mark whether the Umno faction that supports Muhyiddin is comfortable working with DAP as Umno generally has a “no PKR, no DAP” stand.
Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) also has bad blood with DAP. DAP secretary-general Lim claimed when he was Finance Minister that Sarawak would go bankrupt in three years’ time if GPS continued to rule the state.
We are now in uncharted waters. And sea conditions no longer favour the MV Perikatan.
The talk that surfaced from a meeting of top Perikatan leaders hosted by the Prime Minister on Monday was that the MV Perikatan
would take on the angry sea.
But in our history, only once has a captain won an epic sea battle. That time it was a mighty ship called the MV Barisan Nasional
with an undisputed majority.
The keyword also to come out from the meeting is bubar (dissolve). The Perikatan government coalition partners discussed this possibility.
There’s no sign that the raging political tide has retreated after the Prime Minister made his offer to the Opposition.
The talk yesterday is that the captain of the MV Perikatan will be stepping down and the next move for the crew is to find a new skipper.
The MV Perikatan will have to be careful not to sail too close to the wind. The ocean is a mighty beast.