I am tickled to learn that PAS' version of compromise with DAP over the Islamic state issue is 'A vote for Barisan Alternatif (BA) is not a vote for an Islamic state' in the BA manifesto ('Islamic state: DAP throws out PAS compromise', July 26).

When DAP which opposes the Islamic state is part of the BA coalition, of course it is true that a vote for BA does not constitute a vote for the Islamic state. This is precisely what PAS wants the non-Muslim electorate to think so that they will vote for the BA.

What is not stated but remains true for its own constituency is that a vote for PAS' candidates (as distinct from any other BA candidate) is still a vote for the Islamic state because PAS holds the mantle of leadership within the BA and will push for this agenda once the election is won!

This position taken by PAS is not inconsistent with its concession that a vote for BA does not constitute a vote for the Islamic state. It is a position that is calculated to allay fears of those who oppose the Islamic state so that they could still be lulled into delivering their votes to the BA; it is a position that does not compromise PAS' raison d'etr and yet opens the way for PAS to push, using its dominant position within the BA, for the agenda of an Islamic state once the election is won.

In short, it is a position to lull and mislead those who are opposed to the Islamic state to still give their votes to the BA, a vehicle for PAS' ambitions.

Yet I concede that there is nothing wrong with PAS' aspirations for an Islamic state just as there is nothing wrong with DAP's secular and pluralistic Malaysian Malaysia agenda.

What is wrong is using all kinds of ambiguous words and expressions that can mean different things to different people for a political platform as if all who listen to them are bereft of the modicum of intelligence to divine through this double-talk and double-think!

I maintain that the component parties of the BA must come out clean and they have no moral right to denigrate the Barisan Nasional for subterfuges and lack of transparency when they can do no better themselves!

May I therefore suggest a more truthful and transparent wording for the BA's manifesto?

It should read: "All component parties of the Barisan Alternatif acknowledge that they have a common enemy in the BN on different sides of the ideological divide [between PAS' Islamic state and DAP's secular and pluralistic state with Keadilan and PRM in the centre unable to make up their minds] but meanwhile all will work for the common goal leaving the differences to be settled later after the election victory".

Paul Warren in 'Kit Siang - man of all seasons' (July 26) came out in a valiant defence of Kit Siang against DAP Socialist Youth chairperson Teng Chang Khim's suggestion that he decline nomination for DAP's central working committee.

Undeniably, Kit Siang is identified with the many causes for the interest of the Malaysian public to which he has dedicated his entire political life with courage and sacrifice.

Indeed his very continuation in a leadership position in the DAP is because he is the very personification of the DAP - a clear and brave voice against abuse of power and injustice.

The DAP has come so far because it has been built over the years on principles as opposed to political expedience. This is the true and real raison d'etr of the DAP.

I suggest that the problem within the DAP, and its problems with its traditional constituency, is that by joining the Barisan Alternatif and 'sleeping' with PAS, a partner of diametrically opposed ideology and principles, for mere political expedience of defeating a common enemy (Barisan Nasional) and sharing power, Kit Siang, as prime mover of this 'misalliance' has struck a mortal blow at the very raison d'etr of the DAP.

I ask: Since when has political expedience been more important to DAP than its steadfast principles upon which its reputation has been built and to which many Malaysians pin their hopes?

He should not allow personal considerations affect, much less lose sight of what the DAP, of which he is a personification, has always stood for: the principles of Malaysian Malaysia in which ordinary citizens have their inalienable rights and benefit from one another's differences; it is not expedience and power!

Even if Kit Siang has, by his personal sacrifices, bequeathed to Malaysians a political awareness and a vigilance against abuse of power to which many Malaysians owe him a debt, and cannot repay, he should do the right thing now, stop the pretense and take the DAP out of a coalition that is structured, not on principles but political expedience, that is never what the DAP has ever stood for.