OCT 29 — Port Klang assemblyman Badrul Hisham Abdullah’s departure from PKR won’t affect the coalition ruling the state.
It still has a healthy 35 members against Barisan Nasional’s 20 and the BN-friendly Badrul in the 56-seat assembly. The fact is, Badrul has hardly been around since Election 2008, and Selangor mentri besar Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim this morning had told him to quit his seat.
Instead, he fought back by quitting PKR to be independent but supportive of BN, just like the three in Perak who caused the Pakatan Rakyat government there to fall in February.
For PKR, the clean-up continues after its unprecedented win in the March 2008 general elections. It put together a motley crew of first-timers, NGO activists and seasoned politicians to get a large share of votes and seats.
Along the way, it found out that some of its elected representatives were not up to the mark, leading to several forced by-elections which they easily regained in Penang and Kedah. But there are now four “political frogs” in the system as elected lawmakers, three of whom are from PKR.
Badrul’s resignation today reflects the snail’s pace that PKR has taken to reshape its party for the future. It is already fraying at the seams in Sabah and persisting reports that secretary-general Datuk Salehuddin Hashim has quit in a huff is hobbling the party.
Salehuddin has denied the reports but like Sabah, there is no smoke without fire.
Party insiders say de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim must assert himself to clean up PKR rather than wait for them to drop off as time goes by. Yet Anwar is taking it slow and easy and is busy with his international engagements and travels. (At this point, he is in the Middle-East.)
In Anwar’s absence, party president, Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail is in charge, as she has been when the party was originally formed in 1999 to press for her husband’s release on sodomy and corruption convictions.
But Wan Azizah is not the charismatic leader that Anwar is. She is charming but unable to hold the party together or make the tough decisions to get rid of deadwood and those who keep it in crisis. That is Anwar’s forte but his failure has led to cases like Badrul plague the party.
He should well take a leaf from the PAS leadership book. Party president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang took just six days after PAS spiritual leader Datuk Nik Aziz Nik Mat’s tirade against “problematic leaders” to get a disciplinary committee to act.
Of course, the issues in PAS have been festering, but Hadi and the party know better than to prolong it. For them, the party’s needs come first and they are willing to confront problems head-on rather than sweeping it under the carpet.
For Anwar, his years in Umno must have led him to delay action until nature takes it course. But allowing this to continue is a reflection of indecisive leadership, akin to that of former prime minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.
But Anwar is not facing Abdullah anymore, after easily outclassing him in Election 2008. He is in a face-off with former Team Wawasan member Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak who has shown he can be decisive and clinical in executing his plans, including the downfall of the Perak Pakatan Rakyat government.
Anwar has to spring clean PKR now or see confidence fall off with every lawmaker who drops off or shouts out something contrary to the party stand.
Rather than tweeting that honey and Wan Azizah’s smile keeps him healthy, Anwar should just listen to his wife, who said this today, “The future of the nation does not lie in the hands of any one individual nor does our party nor does this coalition”.
Clean up. Or get cleaned out in the next elections. At least Najib knows that.
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