Ku Li: From prince to leading contender for premiership

Ku Li: From prince to leading contender for premiership

By Abdul Rashid Hasnol



BY now, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s resignation as Prime Minister (PM) tomorrow (Aug 16) is all but certain. Having informed the Perikatan Nasional (PN) and Bersatu’s top brass of his intention to step down, his 17-month premiership is set to go down as the country’s shortest, barring any surprises following his audience with the Yang di-Pertuan Agong tomorrow.

Now, the attention shifts to his possible successors and by the looks of it, Gua Musang MP Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah is the odds-on favourite and it’s not hard to see why. Umno, having a sizable chunk of lawmakers in the Dewan Rakyat, would want to reclaim the post traditionally held by the party since Independence in 1957 to 2018.

Of all the leading contenders in the party to succeed Muhyiddin as Premier, Tengku Razaleigh, or Ku Li as he is popularly known, is the best compromise. Unlike party president Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, Tengku Razaleigh does not have a slew of pending criminal cases against him.

Other contenders like Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob and Senior Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein are too divisive within the party, as they had gone against Umno directive to cut ties with Muhyiddin. Hishammuddin does not even sit on the party’s supreme council.

Meanwhile, ex-PM Datuk Seri Najib Razak is out of the question, having been sentenced to 12-years imprisonment for corruption which he is appealing, not to mention the outstanding criminal charges he is facing.

This leaves Tengku Razaleigh as the compromise candidate from the party to wrest back the coveted post. The Kelantan prince has close ties with the royalty, which is an added bonus considering the palace’s more overt role these days in Malaysian body politic.

Among the opposition, Tengku Razaleigh, the ex-Semangat 46 president is more acceptable compared with the likes of Hishammuddin and Ismail Sabri. Neither has he rubbed fellow politicians the wrong way or prone to gaffes like some of his more junior MPs.

But while Tengku Razaleigh, in his heydays had served as Minister of Finance and Minister of International Trade and Industry (MITI), the 84-year-old came from a bygone era. The last time he sat in Cabinet as MITI Minister was in 1987, where geopolitics was dominated by the US-USSR Cold War.

Now, the dominant trade war is between the US and China where complex matters like 5G technology, biotechnology, machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) play out.

Will Ku Li, who doesn’t even have an official Facebook Page now, have what it takes to lead a country going through the worst twin crises of health and economy we have ever seen?

And can Tengku Razaleigh be able to hold a coalition hastily cobbled together by parties with competing interests? Will he be held ransom by parties who put their personal interests above that of a nation which badly needs to focus its resources in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic and reviving the economy?

And has Tengku Razaleigh struck any deals with Umno’s “court cluster” who are facing criminal charges like Najib and Zahid? Muhyiddin has revealed that his reluctance to interfere in the judicial process was the motivation for some Umno MPs to seek his ouster.

If Muhyiddin’s assertion is true, how are we to believe these culprits will not pressure the new PM to do the same? Are we also to believe that there’s no quid pro quo for backing Tengku Razaleigh as PM?

There are many unanswered questions should Tengku Razaleigh be sworn in as PM9 as he finally realises his dream since the failed challenge for the Umno presidency 34 years ago. Whether Malaysians share his dream or will continue to be stuck in a nightmare, remains to be seen. – Aug 15, 2021

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kt note: "Someone" will run so green he may have a heart-attack, wakakaka.