Any decision the PKR political bureau meeting this afternoon reaches on the Zulkifli Noordin issue must be weighed against the myriad small insurgencies waged in recent weeks by some members who had crossed over from Barisan Nasional components.

The situation faced last week by PKR's Selangor state executive councillor, Dr Xavier Jayakumar, where he was questioned by police over alleged failure to disburse funds allocated for Tamil schools stemmed from reports lodged by party members who had crossed over from MIC.

Jayakumar had denied that there was any failure to disburse monies from an allocated fund of RM4 million, furnished proof of it, and wearily lamented as termite-like the tendencies of ex-MIC members now in PKR.

lina joy court hearing palace of justice 300507 zulkifli nordin More urgent now is the case of the problematic Kulim Bandar Bharu MP Zulkifli. For the better part of a year and a half, Zulkifli has publicly lashed out at friends and foes alike.

We do not know what Zulkifli would have done in isolation if the PKR politburo had endorsed the decision of its disciplinary committee in 2008 that he be sacked for intruding on a Bar Council meeting called to discuss the question of religious conversions.

The sacking recommendation was instead held in abeyance, with no action taken so far.

There followed two events: one, Abdullah Yeop Sani, a former Malaysian ambassador to Spain, resigned his chairmanship of the PKR disciplinary committee; and two, Zulkifli went on to supply further proof that he is not restrained by the mores that govern the public deportment of elected representatives of PKR, or for that matter, Pakatan Rakyat.

In an ominous click of the political ratchet, Zulkifli in recent days has lodged a police report against PAS MP Khalid Samad and denounced his Pakatan colleague in trenchant terms.

The PKR politburo's counsel of forbearance has had the desired effect on Zulkifli. The man has simply become more brazen.

It may be pertinent at this point to recall what Zulkifli told the disciplinary committee when it first hauled him up - that he was the son of a policeman and has an elder brother in the Special Branch.

Mysterious disappearance

Now, in the immediate aftermath of the Bar Council incident, Zulkifli went incommunicado for some time during which there was a report, of mysterious origin, that he had been detained under the ISA.

As far as PKR is concerned, he has never adequately accounted for his short ‘disappearing act'.

Yesterday, Zulkifli was present at the national mosque to pay his respects to former minister Ghazali Shafie who died on Sunday. He was seen to be on amiable terms with a top-ranked police officer.

Now any attempt to impute guilt by association would be contemptible, more so when inferred from behavior at occasions when the requisite solemnities demand a general forgetting of political differences in the face of mortality.

But judging from his actions over the past year-and-a-half is it unreasonable to surmise that Zulkifli may be acting from a script where he is not the sole author?

Today PKR's politburo must weigh the consequences of their past laxity towards him against the reality of his current impudence and appraise that against the danger of giving out wrong signals to watching covert insurgents within its fold.