I refer to the malaysiakini report Husband vs wife for PKR No 1 .

Can anything else be more original? Will what we see in the coming PKR Congress from May 25 to 27 be nothing better than political strategising to maintain power within family lines?

PKR president Wan Azizah is reported to be defending her post as president of PKR having collected 10 nominations. However, her husband, Anwar Ibrahim, received the highest number of nominations (120), while another party veteran, Abdul Rahman Othman, acquired seven nominations.

Initially, Wan Azizah said that she would step aside and concede the presidency to her husband. However, if Anwar were to contest, it remains uncertain if he can even assume the chair as his five-year ban for participation in politics following his previous convictions still remains in force until April 2008.

In fact, even Anwar's PKR membership is questionable. Is he or is he not a member of PKR?

However, assuming that the Registrar of Societies fails to recognise Anwar's candidacy and victory, the ploy is very simple. It would be safe to assume that power will be transferred to the next-in-line candidate who reins in the second highest number of votes, i.e. Wan Azizah. She could be proclaimed as party president by default or acting president until Anwar's five-year ban lapses.

Hence, this explains the political motivation behind the husband and wife competing against each other in the party's polls. It is a maneuver merely to prevent leadership and power from drifting into the hands of a third party. It was already reported earlier that their daughter, Nurul Izzah, is keen to make a name for herself in the Malaysian political scene.

The strategy of the 'AA camp' (Anwar-Azizah) will not send any rays of hope for other upcoming PKR leaders. It resembles the tactic exercised by the DAP to retain power for their own family structures.

Isn't it a fact that prior to the 2004 DAP elections, the MP for Ipoh Barat, M Kulasegaran was temporarily parked as acting secretary-general for the DAP? Wasn't it a fact that the DAP elections were deliberately postponed by two weeks from Aug 18 to 19 to Sept 4 and 5, 2004 with the specific purpose of allowing the return of Lim Guan Eng to take up the party's secretary- general's post? It surely must have been a great sacrifice (or stratagem, perhaps) for Kulasegaran to vacate the long-sought after secretary-general's chair

The Anwar-Azizah team is not Malaysia's version of 1980s Hollywood's TV series, 'The 'A' Team'. In Malaysia, the AA camp wants to remain in power permanently, thus closing the door for other future leaders to come into the PKR fold. The DAP practice of imperial presidency has reached and is being mimed by PKR.