Let ‘hot’ court cases run their course, Umno urged

FMT:

Let ‘hot’ court cases run their course, Umno urged

A political analyst believes there’s a disconnect between the conservative Malay crowd and the more progressive urban folk.

PETALING JAYA: A political analyst says Umno should allow court cases implicating party leaders to be duly completed under due process of law, instead of attempting to have the charges dropped by the Perikatan Nasional government.

Awang Azman Pawi of Universiti Malaya said such attempts could ruin Umno’s reputation among its own supporters.

“Let the courts decide whether they are guilty or not. The rule of law must be upheld whether they’re in the government or the opposition. The PN government and civil society need to ensure that there are no interventions in any court cases,” Awang Azman told FMT.

The cases against certain party leaders and members was said to be among the reasons for Umno’s discontent with the PN government, as stated by Barisan Nasional secretary-general Ahmad Maslan.

But Awang Azman said the high-profile cases were not the only reason for Umno’s threats to withdraw support for PN, a move which would cause the current government to collapse.

He said every party leader probably had their own narrative.

However, Oh Ei Sun, a senior fellow at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs, said Ahmad Maslan’s remarks were unlikely to deter Umno supporters, whom he said would probably consider these cases as a matter of political persecution.

He said there was a disconnect between the conservative Malay crowd and the more progressive urban folk about the charges, with the latter viewing the cases as necessary to restore the government’s integrity.

“But because Umno derives its primary electoral strength from the former group, so Ahmad Maslan was just playing to the tune of most Umno supporters, in addition to trying to save his own skin.

“Perversely speaking, if PPBM is serious about retaining Umno in the ruling coalition, it has scarcely any practical choice but to accede to Umno’s wishes, including dropping the charges against major Umno leaders,” he told FMT.

He said PPBM would not suffer any negative political effects in doing so as the party was already not in favour among more progressive-minded voters after the Sheraton Move early last year.

“PPBM and the whole ruling coalition would now have to focus on appealing to conservative-minded voters who are actually much larger in numbers, and who would actually applaud the dropping of these charges which they see as politically-motivated,” he said.

Ahmad Maslan’s comments had been highlighted by the recently-removed BN secretary-general Annuar Musa, with the latter saying this confirmed that Umno’s potential split from PPBM was not due to a question of policies or services to the people.

But Annuar had been under fire in the days leading up to his removal, with the Ketereh MP seen to be friendly with PN.

The fate of the PN government remains in the balance after most of Umno’s 191 divisions had called for the party to withdraw its cooperation with PPBM.

The Umno Supreme Council, which met on Wednesday night, deferred its decision on its support for PPBM to its annual general assembly which is scheduled to be held on Jan 31.