It is reported by Malaysia’s National News Agency, Bernama, and featured in the widely read online news portal Malaysiakini that the prime minister of Malaysia is gearing up some “new work styles” to ram through an imminent general election (Najib: I am not afraid of anyone, Malaysiakini, Sept 3, 2016).

In his address to the Pekan Umno division delegates’ conference, the prime minister oddly sounded rather desperate. The well-informed segment of society cannot be condemned for interpreting that here is a leader who may take desperate measures to face off his ‘enemies’ for he claimed that he is “not afraid to face off the endless attacks from within and outside the country”.

Najib, who is also the Pekan Umno division head, urged all the 148 Umno branches in Pekan to struggle with him to obtain a majority of more than 40,000 votes in the next general election to give a “most solid answer” to those who attacked him.

And he admitted that he has his hands full as he has “...to manage national issues which are becoming more and more complex including the wider external dimension.”

Whatever that “more complex including the wider external dimension” means, the public opinion here in Malaysia and elsewhere is already zeroing in on his 1MDB debacle that is seeing many victims fall in several destinations and organisations being implicated or even being summoned to provide explanations that may spell disaster for their operatives.

Even more telling is the fact that he has openly admitted that it is the village voter who ensures the victory of Umno and hence the continued rule by the over half -century old political party.

There is certain desperation in his not wanting to lose the rural support as this has time and time again proven always to have been the backbone of Umno’s continued reign.

Hence one can clearly see through his desperate intentions when Najib who also holds tight the nation’s purse string as the finance minister “pledged” that he will “look for additional funds for the 2017 Budget to implement more rural development to ease the burden borne by the villagers.”

But what is most disturbing for those who believe in the democratic electoral principles of fair and just elections is the fact that Najib, unashamedly, has admitted that Umno has to "...look after the villagers because they are the ones who are our strong supporters each year, and have never surrendered to Umno’s political enemies, and because of them Umno is still able to stand up tall until today”.

Najib is dead right. It is these uninformed rural folks “who are willing to live and die with Umno” whom he has to count on to bolster his position. All they want is newly paved roads, money for renovating the increasing sizes of their homes, subsidies here and there, some sponsored celebrations in the name of religious fervor and to be engaged in a drummed-up war that the Malay race is in danger of being attacked.

And so the prime minister has admitted too that in preparation for the D-day, he will “ issue work instructions unlike in the past, (whereby his) operations will use better methods that are organised and using more dynamic technology”.

‘National Security Council in his firm grasp’

Whatever that means, the public opinion will not discount the fact that Najib now also has the much feared National Security Council in his firm grasp. He needs not the approval of His Majesty the Monarch of Malaysia or the Council of Rulers’ approval to do as he pleases all in the drummed up name of religion, race and Umno’s survival that ultimately makes the embroiled leader of Malaysia stay on or even choose as he pleases to make a safe exit in the face of the global investigations in progress.

The one person who is being directly challenged is Dr Mahathir Mohamad whom he obviously singled out in his speech to the Umno delegates in his home constituency.

The opposition forces who are clearly set on using the 1MDB as the ammunition of political war in the coming general elections must let logic prevail. Taking Najib’s seemingly desperate stand as interpreted from his Pekan speech, if the opposition parties think they can crack the power bubble that Najib is reinforcing by trying to win the votes for their own party, they are going to be bitterly mistaken.

The 14th general election is lost to Umno if it is a war fought by various parties trying to secure a win to grab power. Instead it has to be a collaborated, coordinated and united front if they are to withstand the onslaught of a desperate leader facing desperate times with a bag of desperate measures.

And to that, they would be wiser to declare their united election manifesto now than later. And that too must reach the villagers because the village folk - the kingmakers so to speak, are the ones who are the strong supporters of the Najib regime as Najib openly admitted.