Hard and potentially dirty fight to be Samy's successor

The battle lines have been drawn for the MIC elections in September. It will once again see a fight between party president S Samy Vellu and his former deputy S Subramaniam.

But the fight is not for the top party post - that was won uncontested by Samy Vellu in March. Instead it will be for the deputy's post.

Former deputy Subramaniam is challenging incumbent G Palanivel for the post and the race is joined by former blue-eyed boy of Samy Vellu, S Sothinathan.

The fight looks set to be an interesting one and by the time the winner in announced in September, some big names in the party would have been toppled.

Further, if Subramaniam gets it right this time, it could include the president himself.

Until today, the contest for the deputy president's post has been relatively clean with the candidates doing their own groundwork to get support.

Supporters of both Palanivel and Sothinathan were also under the impression that their candidate had the backing of the president.

And at the same time, the manner with which Subramaniam was embraced by Samy after the huge defeat in the 2008 general election also gave the impression that the cold war between these two, which started in the late 1970s, was finally settled.

However, all that changed in Samy Vellu's press conference today where in one sweep he managed to send out several messages to the party members, and more importantly, to the party leaders.

It has become quite apparent that he would be endorsing Palanivel for the deputy president's post just as he had in the last party elections which saw the defeat of Subramaniam.

In addition, Samy Vellu has also sent a clear message to vice-president Sothinathan that he was wrong in assuming the president would back him for the deputy's post.

Most importantly, the message was clear for Subramaniam that the president still sees him as an enemy and not a comrade.

Post-general election huddle

The leadership battle in MIC today started from a very different scenario after the March 2008 general election in which many of the party's bigwigs were defeated, including Samy Vellu, Palanivel and Sothinathan.

In the aftermath of the humiliation, Samy Vellu gathered everyone together in the bid to make the party relevant again.

It was under this situation that he welcomed Subramaniam back into his camp.

At a meeting which took place just days after the general election, Samy Vellu had supposedly told Subramaniam that they should forego their differences to make the party strong again.

It is also learnt that the president had also promised a bigger role for his former deputy in the party, including the possibility of leading the party one day.

As for Sothinathan, he was made the head of the party's social arm YSS. He was also roped into the party's education arm MIED and spent most of his days in the party headquarters in Kuala Lumpur having daily access to the president.

And more importantly, he also headed the party's rebranding exercise, a brainchild of the president.

The only person who was clearly missing for the party's new scheme of things was his deputy, Palanivel. This prompted many to speculate that ties between Samy Vellu and Palanivel were strained and beyond repair.

Samy Vellu himself did nothing to correct this perception and has apparently informed few party leaders of his broken relationship with his deputy.

Sothinathan's star was very bright at that stage and he was tipped to be the president's choice for the deputy's post and his eventual successor.

At that point of time - just months after the general election, both Subramaniam and Sothinathan were quietly confident that they had Samy Vellu's backing to challenge Palanivel in a contest which was more than a year away at that stage.

Tide turned in favour of Palanivel

Palanivel ( left in photo ) however was not to be totally discounted.

Although he was at one point not in the president's good books and looked set to be discarded by Samy Vellu, he remained prominent enough and slowly started working his way in by gathering grassroots support.

Local party leaders were surprised to see Palanivel making house calls to put forward his views on how the party could be redeemed in the next general election.

He was missing from official party functions, and even in functions that he attended he remained quiet, albeit busy chalking up the numbers among the members.

However, the tide seemed to have turned after the MIED scandal where the party president himself was allegedly implicated - but nothing proven against him - in a financial scandal.

People in the know speculate that Palanivel knows more about the scandal than he is letting out. This is however unproven.

Observers nevertheless note that after the scandal, which also implicated several other senior party leaders, Palanivel carried himself quite confidently.

He is said to have told his supporters that there was no way he would be defeated in party polls.

At about the same time, Samy Vellu was also telling party leaders that his relationship with Palanivel had the usual ups and downs and that everything was fine between them.

True to his words, he was also mending ties with Palanivel. He is said to have personally told Palanivel that he would endorse him as the deputy again.

Sothinathan's ( right ) people claimed that Samy Vellu was making the same promise to their leader too.

And together with his supposed promise to back Subramaniam in March 2008, Samy Vellu seemed to have given the impression of supporting all three of them at various times.

It is uncertain how Subramaniam and Sothinathan would react to Samy Vellu's acerbic attacks against them today.

To make things worse for them, Palanivel was seated next to Samy Vellu at the press conference.

This, to Palanivel's supporters, moves him one step closer to be the anointed successor.

A pact between Sothi and Subra?

The party elections will be held in September, giving both Subramaniam and Sothinathan a short time to plan their battle against the Samy Vellu-Palanivel axis.

Between them they can surely dig up many issues to stake a claim to be a better deputy than the incumbent, and eventually a better president of the party.

One can also never discount a pact between the two spurned leaders, especially if they do look ahead beyond the party polls this year into the next one where one of them can fight for the presidency.

However, the question remains if these two can work together, and even if they do, whether they can form an effective and equal partnership.

Such a partnership will also mean that one of them would have to forego challenging Palanivel this time around.

The best bet is still Subramaniam ( left in photo ), given his years of experience in fighting Samy Vellu - unsuccessfully though - for this is not a battle against Palanivel for them, but against the president and his influence.

As for Samy Vellu, the plan for now is to see Palanivel retaining his seat, after which the president is said to have plans to step down sometime early next year.

That would allow Palanivel to become an acting president and the most senior vice-president to be the acting deputy.

If that happens, Subramaniam's last chance at helming the party will surely evaporate but for Sothinathan all will still not be the end.

As it stands, he could take the humiliation now but forge ties with one of the vice-presidents so that he will get a clearer run in the next party elections.