Idealism and realism are the warp and woof of politics. The smartest politicians are adept at draping their self-interest with a mantle of idealism.

Though they take care to avoid being seen as the slaves of their interests, they are shrewd enough to avert being wedded to their ideals, knowing that the political game is rife with compromise.

Over the weekend, two politicos who had attempted in the past few years to weave a credible path between the conflicting imperatives of ideals and interests got to savour a measure of vindication.

One suspects that the DAP Penang state assemblyperson Teh Yee Cheu (photo) would have gained scant satisfaction over being vindicated by the landslide that occurred on Saturday in his constituency of Tanjung Bungah that took 11 lives.

When your warnings against a certain practice – in Teh's case, against hill slope development – are not heeded and this eventually leads to a deadly outcome, there is no satisfaction at being proven prophetic.

Teh had, in a lonely and courageous fashion, over the past three years warned his colleagues in the DAP-led state government against hill slope development.

The collapse of hillside earth in Lengkok Lembah Pantai on Saturday, has shown Teh to have been a better guardian of public interest than chief minister Lim Guan Eng, in whose side Teh has been a thorn by constantly criticising hillside property development.

The other politician who over the weekend has emerged with his integrity intact from his meanderings through the wreckage of the contest in 2015 between professionals and theologians in PAS is Mahfuz Omar, the MP for Pokok Sena.

Mahfuz, who like Teh has had to find his wobbly way between his convictions as a PAS loyalist and his sense the party has taken a wrong turn, hit on a resolution to his dilemma.

At one stage, that dilemma seemed hopelessly fraught.

As a PAS loyalist, he could not bring himself to join the splinter, Amanah, to which all the professionals defeated in the 2015 party poll flocked; as a longtime striver for regime change in Malaysia, however, he could not continue to stay in a party that has been in a clumsy courtship with incumbents Umno for two years now.

Mahfuz and a coterie of like-minded PAS dissidents attended the Amanah convention in Alor Star on Saturday, and were duly told by PAS officials they would not be nominated to stand as candidates for the party in GE14.

The MP for Pokok Sena reacted with fog-cutting disdain. “I would like to say thank you for not nominating me because even if PAS nominated me, I will not accept it because I will be seen betraying the people,” said the two-term federal legislator.

Prior to this bolt of clarity from the man himself, it was hard to see how Mahfuz would be able to resolve his dilemma at being caught between his ideals and his interest while keeping his integrity intact.

It's not that Mahfuz has found an expedient way through the horns of a painful dilemma; it's that he has allowed his party to zigzag its way through a maze of trying to simultaneously court Umno while maintaining that it is still an opposition party.

That this stance won't wash and is not sustainable has redounded to Mahfuz's credit such that he is now able to maintain that even if he is nominated to contest in GE14 by PAS, he won't be able to accept because it would be tantamount to betrayal of the people's interest.

PKR leader Nurul Izzah Anwar (photo) has called on Pakatan Harapan to project a narrative – the widely-held shorthand that marks a candidate or party – to win GE14.

She has argued that Prime Minister Najib Razak has succeeded in projecting a narrative – that he is not guilty of corruption and is concerned to alleviate the people's concerns.

In contrast, Nurul says the opposition Harapan strives in vain for one.

Judging from the examples of Teh and Mahfuz, the best narrative that Harapan could project is that of being principled.

There's a corollary to that in Teh's instance: the DAP should deny Guan Eng a third-term as chief minister of Penang for culpably ignoring the threat of environmental degradation to Penang that Teh warned him about, and that Saturday's deadly landslide and recent flooding in Penang have combined to indict his leadership.

The jury will have to wait a while more for Mahfuz's reservations about PAS' recently ordained course of courtship of Umno to culminate in an indictment.

TERENCE NETTO has been a journalist for more than four decades. A sobering discovery has been that those who protest the loudest tend to replicate the faults they revile in others.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.