Many romantic movies from Hollywood often show only the sweet side of a courtship and the dream wedding.

Just to name a few movies like ‘Pretty Woman’, ‘Sleepless in Seattle’, ‘You Got Mail’, etc. The movies all ended with the dream wedding or when the hero proposed.

Hollywood never shows what happens after the courtship or wedding is over because it’s often not a pretty side. It takes a lot of hard work to make a marriage work.

That is what is happening to Pakatan Rakyat. The rakyat saw the courtship and the wedding ceremony during the March general election last year but the honeymoon’s over and now PR is faced with all sorts of problems - public infighting, jealousy, jostling for positions, fighting for scarce resources, etc.

PR must avoid the path taken by the BN. All the reps must remember that they are working for the people and put aside their personal differences.

The PR reps must think and act like Malaysians and not just speak on issues regarding a specific ethnic race or specific religion.

PR must also act and think as a collective organisation. This will mean that only senior officials from PR can make statements regarding policies and directions. This is akin to any other organisation.

Only the board and senior management can make press statements. Any disagreement should be discussed and resolved behind closed doors. Senior and junior leaders of PR should never criticise one another through the media as such criticism can be easily twisted by the BN-controlled media.

Most important is that PR leaders act and think like statesmen and focus on ‘nation-building’. Although the senior leaders of the PR are beginning to act and talk like statesmen, more can still be done.

In addition, the middle-tier leadership of PR must buck up and focus on the future. Making statements like: ‘I want to grill the new Datuk Bandar on his past dealings in another local council’ is not the act of a statesman but merely an ‘opposition party out to make some noise’. Those days are over; the PR must behave like leaders of tomorrow.

Barack Obama did not talk about the oppression that the African Americans suffered or how more help needs to be channelled to help the minorities in the US.

Instead, Obama talked about his vision for the future and how America needs to change for the better. In the same way, PR must also talk about what needs to be done for the future instead of dwelling on the past.

Many dream weddings in the West have ended up in divorcee. Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman and Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston, just to name a few.

Will the dream wedding of PR end up in a bitter divorce or will they live happily ever after?