I’m neither a political analyst nor politician but as an ordinary citizen, I see the so-called ‘Kajang move’ as a blatant betrayal of people’s trust for own political gains. I have read various articles and explanations from political analysts and politicians including the one by Rafizi Ramli who explains the necessity for such a move, but I’m just simply unconvinced.

Lee Chin Cheh, after resigning as Kajang state assemblyperson, in a statement stated that his decision to vacate the seat is for the “common good and to strengthen the Pakatan’s ability to serve the Selangor people”. Azmin Ali and Rafizi then subsequently came out with statements saying that this is part of their strategy to defend Selangor and to capture Putrajaya.

My question is, if this ‘Kajang move’ is for the common good of Pakatan Rakyat and part of the strategy to capture Putrajaya, then why are the other so-called ‘equal coalition partners’ of Pakatan Rakyat, namely DAP and PAS, unaware of this? Even top leaders like Lim Guan Eng and Nik Aziz Nik Mat admitted that they were kept in the dark.

Even though several top leaders from both DAP and PAS were seen at the press conference when Khalid Ibrahim announced the decision to field Anwar Ibrahim for the Kajang by-election, that was seen as being ‘forced’ as they were left with no choice but to adopt that decision made solely by PKR or if not, it would look very bad and may lead Pakatan Rakyat to an even worse situation.

Further, Rafizi claimed that the decision to put Anwar Ibrahim in Kajang is to defend Selangor from being taken by Umno. The question is, are all these Selangor Pakatan Rakyat state assemblypersons and leaders so weak that they can’t even defend Selangor despite ruling Selangor with a comfortable two-thirds majority?

Then how is Pakatan Rakyat going to manage if they had won Kedah, Terengganu and Perak in the last general election? Are they now going to ask Anwar Ibrahim to get some superpower to split himself up and to contest in all the states to ‘defend’ those states from being taken by Umno as well?

This argument also exposed the weakness in Pakatan Rakyat as it shows that only Anwar can lead Pakatan Rakyat and Pakatan Rakyat cannot survive without Anwar. Let’s be realistic, Anwar will not be there forever. What if tomorrow Anwar is convicted of the sodomy charge? Will that be the end of Pakatan Rakyat?

Hence for me, all the reasons and explanations given by these politicians are more like excuses and afterthoughts.

I can’t help but to think that this ‘Kajang move’ has a lot to do with the Khalid-Azmin conflict as this came so suddenly in the midst of the conflicts. I can’t help but think that this ‘Kajang move’ is nothing but for some leaders’ own political gains. I don’t know and maybe it’s just that I am too pessimistic. And I really hope so.