PAS janganlah tembak, janganlah main poker bluff!

There's a Penang Hokkien phrase called 'pnee been'.

'Pnee' means 'action' or 'become' or 'do/make something' like in 'pnee kui pnee kwai' which literally means 'become the devil and do something weird/eerie', but figuratively would translate as 'up to something naughty or mischievous'.

'pnee kui pnee kwai'?

wakakaka

'Been' is of course 'face' where 'boe been' literally means 'no face' or figuratively 'lose face'.

Back to 'pnee been'. Figuratively it means 'turn nasty/ugly or unfriendly'.

Well, yesterday FMT reported that Pak Haji Hadi Awang, at a fund raising event held at the Pusat Tarbiyah Islamiah Kelantan (Putik), told PKR You have no right to block hudud. It was unmistakably a 'pnee been' statement to PKR.

But some have been puzzled with what they see as Pak Haji's misdirected 'pnee been', because Anwar Ibrahim's party or rather his wife's (wakakaka) party had not made any stand yet on PAS' intention to implement hudud in Kelantan.

It has been the other Pakatan component party, DAP, whose several leaders have told PAS publicly DAP won't support or disagree with PAS' hudud intention.

Anthony Loke has even told PAS to leave Pakatan if the Islamic party insists on having hudud in Kelantan, though I wonder whether Anwar Ibrahim and PKR would agree to Loke's call to PAS to f**k off if it pursues the issue of hudud because that will put an end to Anwar's dream of becoming PM - yes, he still holds on to that dream even as he knows he'll end up shortly in jail.

Today, DAP is outraged at Pak Haji's claim that Pakatan’s top council gave blessings for PAS’s hudud plan. News channel Astro Awani had reported Pak Haji as saying: “We have talked about this being the right of PAS leaders. We had issued a joint statement involving Pakatan Rakyat leaders that PAS’s right should be respected because this agenda came before Pakatan Rakyat existed.”

DAP leaders repudiated kau kau his claim, as reported in TMI's DAP leaders deny Pakatan’s top council gave blessings for PAS’s hudud plan.

Lim Guan Eng and Gobind Deo want Pak Haji to show proof of such an agreement, with the latter saying:

"This claim is totally untrue. The common agenda of Pakatan Rakyat signed by Hadi himself clearly excludes hudud. In addition, DAP has always made it crystal clear that it is totally against hudud as it is unconstitutional and unsuitable in a multiracial country like ours."

TMI reported that: Gobind also repeated a call by DAP's organising secretary Anthony Loke on Friday that PAS should consider pulling out from Pakatan Rakyat if it wanted to go ahead with its hudud agenda.

"If it is true, then perhaps PAS should seriously reconsider the relevance of its continued existence in Pakatan Rakyat."

Gobind reminded PAS that it had never made hudud as part of its general election campaign last year.

"PAS cannot now twist the facts and try to justify the push for hudud in Kelantan. Quite apart from the fact that it clearly violates the Federal Constitution, PAS ran its campaign without saying at all that it would implement hudud in Kelantan or elsewhere.

Gobind Deo explained that has been why voters had given their strong support to PR which had not made hudud as part of the coalition's agenda.

As I mentioned in my previous post The real objective of PAS' Hudud, PAS has this naughty Anwar-ish impatient but premature habit of jumping the gun when it believes it could smell success.

'pnee kui pnee kwai'?

wakakaka

And I provided three examples of its 'pnee been' (turn nasty/ugly) characteristics, one being the during the campaign leading up to the 2004 general elections when it attempted to hijack the then public sympathy for poor Dr Wan Azizah to run away with its own Islamist agenda (and flopped badly together with PKR), ...

..... the second being its nasty selfish hijacking (again) of Kota Damansara state seat for PSM (as agreed by Pakatan) which ended up in BN winning a sure Pakatan seat if there was no 3-corner fight, ...

..... and thirdly, the most 'pnee been' of them all in 2012 when Allahyarham Harun Taib with unbelievable arrogance declared that PAS would team up with 'other pacts' (how many pacts are there in Malaysian politics?) to implement hudud if Pakatan won't play ball.

Nonetheless it's still sad (if the Astro Awani news report has been true) that Pak Haji would descend to such level to (in Gobind's words) 'twist the facts and try to justify the push for hudud in Kelantan'.

Just a reminder of what happened in May 2012, let us refer to the Malaysiakini's news report then, PAS to Karpal: Let's celebrate our differences, which tells us that in a PAS press conference that:

PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang sidestepped queries about Karpal's demands for Pakatan to thrash out the matter, and instead said Pakatan should focus on common goals.

"This issue does not arise. Our concept is to continue with Pakatan and focus on common issues such as poverty eradication, fairness, Islam as the federal religion, Malay special privilleges with the rights of others being protected and constitutional monarchy.

"These is the concept that we have agreed upon. There are differences, but we will celebrate these differences among ourselves," he told the press at the PAS headquarters.

Asked to comment on the party's stance on whether it will implement hudud law if it came to power, Hadi replied: "I have made official statements many times, there is no need for me to repeat, for now we would like to focus on the present."

That (hudud), can wait when we are in power, we are not yet in power. For now let us focus on the challenges in front of us which is the general election," he added.

Well, he certainly has since changed 180 degrees from his "let's celebrate our differences" message to our late Bhai.

Perhaps this could well be an additional reason to what I wrote yesterday in The real objective of PAS' Hudud. Maybe PAS somehow believes with Bhai gone, there is no longer any DAP objection to the Islamic Party's hudud aspiration.

In 2012 I had written the following:

What [Allahyarham] Harun Taib has said was just unmistakably this: If Pakatan wins in GE-13, and PAS has a sizable number of federal MPS, it will if necessary combine with UMNO (and perhaps the Chosen Ones of PKR) to implement hudud.

You can spin it any which way you like, like Hadi Awang’s sweet nothing Let's celebrate our differences to Karpal Singh’s voiced concerns about PAS’ hudud intention, but there's no mistaking PAS' openly voiced intention to jettison the alliance like a used tissue paper, of course after it has already won enough seats with support from (DAP/PKR canvassed) non-Muslim votes.

The problem with celebrating the 'difference' Hadi Awang alluded to, namely hudud, is that once the Islamic legal system has been implemented, non-Muslims will discover too late it's not something they will imagine celebrating, assuming that celebrations, especially those of non-Muslim variety like Valentine’s Day, concerts by foreign artists, wearing of lipstick and perfumes, Lion Dances, dancing, Thaipusam, Cheng Beng, etc, will even be permitted.

In fact we had had the misfortune to experience PAS' usual arrogant impatience in both Kelantan and (under Allahyarham Azizan Abdul Razak's) Kedah where PAS intruded into non-Muslim areas of activities like unisex hair dressing salons and koe-tai's, etc.

Therefore, those apologists who have attempted to dismiss Karpal Singh’s (and my) concerns by arguing that it won’t affect non-Muslims or that if non-Muslims have done nothing wrong they shouldn't be worried about hudud, have not convinced any of us, more so when we have witnessed in so many other nations ruled by syariah-hudud laws that such laws in the hands of unaccountable clerics have oppressed rather than protect the rights of the ordinary people.

Please name me one, just one Islamic nation anywhere in the world, as a model of good governance, and a nation where social justice, human rights and democratic processes are upheld.

Thus, we will see hudud invariably and severely affect the lives of non-Muslim Malaysians, regardless of what mealy-mouthed promise PAS may offer to non-Muslim voters.

[as were witnessed in both Kelantan and Kedah and to lesser extent on Valentine's Days (wakakaka) and concerts by foreign artistes].

Incidentally lawyer-blogger Art Harun has written a very important article on the Malaysian Constitution and hudud in The Star Online's Hudud and the basic-structure doctrine.

Art Harun raised a constitutional case which occurred just a mere 6 days before the formation of Malaysia, a 1963 merger of Malaya, Singapore, Sarawak and Sabah (and f**k Brunei).

Coincidentally, the plaintiff was the state of Kelantan. Art Harun wrote:

... six days before the formation of Malaysia, Kelantan sued the Federal Government of Malaya and Tunku Abdul Rahman for, among others, a declaration that the Malaysia Agreement and the Malaysia Act were null and void and not binding on the state.

Kelantan argued that the Malaysia Agreement was invalid because:

i) it violated the 1957 Federation of Malaya Agreement when Malaya was formed and the state agreed to be part of Malaya;

ii) its consent (and that of other states) was never given for the Malaysia Agreement;

iii) the Sultan of Kelantan should be a party to the Agreement;

iv) the Rulers were never consulted;

v) Parliament had no power to legislate over the matter.

To cut a long story short, Chief Justice Thompson, who heard the matter, held that the Malaysia Agreement and Malaysia Act did not in any way contravene the Federal Constitution and therefore they were valid and enforceable.

What is more important about this case is what CJ Thompson said in his judgment:

“In doing these things I cannot see that Parliament went in any way beyond its powers or that it did anything so fundamentally revolutionary as to require fulfilment of a condition which the Constitution itself does not prescribe, that is to say, a condition to the effect that the state of Kelantan or any other state should be consulted”.

That statement by CJ Thompson lays the basic-structure doctrine in constitutionalism.

Basically, what it means is that notwithstanding the powers of Parliament to amend the Constitution, it can never amend the Constitution in such manner which is so fundamentally revolutionary as to change the basic structure of the Constitution without inviting the fulfilment of “a condition which the constitution itself does not prescribe”.

So, the judge was saying if a proposed amendment is so fundamentally revolutionary, Parliament can’t merely amend the Constitu­tion without fulfilling other conditions which the Constitution itself does not prescribe.

The learned judge's ruling was backed up by other legal experts.

Art Harun said that while the formation of the Federation of Malaysia did NOT do anything so fundamentally revolutionary as to require fulfilment of a condition which the Constitution itself does not prescribe, the implementation of hudud will, whether in a state or federally.

Art Harun concluded: ... any proposed amendment of our Federal Constitution or state constitution to introduce hudud law or to change the criminal judicial system – whether applicable to Muslims only or otherwise – to one which is syariah based would be beyond the power of Parliament or the respective state legislative assembly to entertain or approve.

The change to hudud or syariah laws would undoubtedly change the basic structure of the administration of the criminal justice system which the states and all the people of Malaysia have agreed to be bound by from day one of the federation. Parliament and all the state legislative assemblies therefore have no right or power to so amend the Federal Constitution or their respective state constitution to effect such a fundamentally revolutionary change.

In fact, Art has wise advice for us when he stated: If PAS says they will implement hudud if Pakatan Rakyat wins Putrajaya, they are either lying or they are idiots who do not know the provisions of our Federal Constitution. Or both.

Hudud is a matter concerning or relating to the affairs of Islam and Muslims. Being so, this matter comes within the jurisdiction and purview of the respective state legislative assemblies. The Federal Government and Parliament do not have the power to impose hudud on Malaysia or any of the states.

If PAS wants to implement hudud in Malaysia as a whole, it must therefore take over ALL the states in Malaysia. So, dear PAS, don’t simply tembak.

I love the last bit when he told PAS, don’t simply tembak, wakakaka.

And may I add a comment to the bullshit about Pakatan giving its blessing to PAS' hudud aspiration (assuming the Astro Awani news report has been correct) and which made DAP mad, janganlah main poker bluff, okay? 'Ni haram tahu! wakakaka.

'pnee been'?

wakakaka