Lokman Adam: A cornered Tun M is finding all means to undermine stability of Anwar’s unity gov’t

Lokman Adam: A cornered Tun M is finding all means to undermine stability of Anwar’s unity gov’t





UMNO supreme council member Datuk Lokman Noor Adam has turned one of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s biggest critics in recent times after he rebutted the former two-time premier for implying that it was not wrong if MPs of the unity government wanted to topple Prime Minister (PM) Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim like what they did to Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin in 2021.

Speaking during a media conference in Putrajaya yesterday (March 28), Malaysia’ longest serving PM of 22 years and 22 months had said that the elected representatives have the right to change the government and that doing so is not against the law.

In a live Facebook broadcast yesterday (March 28), Lokman has dubbed Dr Mahathir’s action as reflecting his precarious position which is likened as nyawa di hujung tanduk (life at knife-edge).

“He knows his time to be hauled up for questioning by MACC (Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission) is getting very close … he knows that the position of his children, cronies is no longer safe … that’s why we see him hopping from one party to another even to the extent of deserting his son’s own party (Pejuang),” commented Lokman who was recently reinstated as UMNO’s supreme council member.

Lokman Noor Adam

Lokman went on to explain that UMNO was able to retract its support against Muhyiddin previously because the party via its president and Barisan Nasional (BN) chairman Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had prior given the Bersatu president an en bloc support.

“Moreover, the anti-party hopping law has yet to come to being back then, hence both Dr Mahathir and Muhyiddin could also implement (their) scheme of things,” argued Lokman.

“But since the party anti-hopping law has come into effect (on Oct 5 last year), MPs can no longer jump parties or issue personal SDs (statutory declarations) to be PM … if that happens within UMNO for example, the party’s secretary-general can issue a letter to the Dewan Rakyat speaker to propose for the seat of that particular UMNO MP to be vacated.”

On that note, Lokman said Dr Mahathir is welcome to topple Anwar’s unity government by means of retracting the support of UMNO MPs if he has any intention to do so “for we don’t want UMNO MPs to look up to Dr Mahathir or Muhyiddin”.

“After all, UMNO MPs have signed loyalty pledge letter (surat akujanji) to give mandate to the party’s president (Zahid) to discuss and decide on their behalf as to whom the party shall forge a coalition with or who should be made the PM,” he added.

Yesterday (March 28), Lokman has challenged Dr Mahathir to explain whether he had ever inherited substantial wealth from his late father which has subsequently enabled his four children to be billionaires today.

This comes as Dr Mahathir has demanded Anwar to furnish evidence of the latter’s claim that he had siphoned the nation’s wealth during his premiership of “22 years plus 22 months” which Anwar used as argument to counter Dr Mahathir’s purported participation in the “Malay Proclamation” event which failed to materialise. – March 29, 2023