What PAS vice-president Husam Musa stated about his party's stand on hudud had, in fact, been stated many times previously and was thus nothing new at all, and DAP and PKR had already understood and accepted thais.

That is why all three parties have been able to work together to deal a heavy blow to Umno/BN in the last general election on March 8.

But everyone body knows that Umno Youth deputy president Khairy Jamaluddin was trying to cause mischief by forcing Husam to say something which would not only put PAS in a tight spot, but also upset DAP and PKR.

Husam had unwittingly fallen into Khairy's neatly laid trap to serve Khairy's political agenda with the impending Kuala Terengganu by-election on Jan 17 and the Umno elections in March when Khairy is involved in a tough three-cornered fight with Mukhriz Mahathir and Mohd Khir Toyo for the Umno Youth presidency. He is doing his best to outbid them.

While the mainstream newspapers mischievously twisted and published Husam's remarks at Khairy's prodding, they conveniently blacked out the fact that Khairy himself had also become victim to his own ploy.

When cornered by the moderator, Khairy himself admitted that Umno would also endorse hudud . Khairy has exposed himself and Umno to be no better than Husam and PAS on the hudud issue, and it is up to the people to judge for themselves who are the troublemakers here.

Khairy's mischievous agenda to split PAS and DAP through reopening and exposing the raw sensitivities of an old issue which both DAP and PAS have been able to resolve through Anwar's brokering, now appears to be backfiring.

DAP has openly said they will back PAS in the Kuala Terengganu by-election. And with Umno and MCA still mired in their messy internal squabbles, the chances of Umno losing Kuala Terengganu are very high.

It is high time Khairy stop playing games and clean up the mess in his own Umno backyard first before trying to cause trouble for the opposition. Clearly he and Umno have not learnt any lesson from the March 8 political tsunami .