COMMENT Which is more to blame - PKR's diffuse command structure or Snap's overreach - for the delay in the working out of a seat-sharing agreement in advance of Sarawak state polls on April 16?

With a week to go to nomination day on April 6, no seat-sharing agreement is in sight between the peninsula-based party and the state's oldest multiracial party which has stirred to new life in the last three months after a long period of dormancy.

Reports early this week that there was discord between Pakatan Rakyat partners, DAP and PKR, over some seats, enough to prevent a seat-sharing agreement being inked between them were overtaken mid-week by news that rationality had triumphed over selfish interests.

 

A seat-sharing deal was indeed reached between DAP and PKR, in which PAS' minimal ambitions were accorded their due.

azlan With that deal over and done with, it was expected that PKR would sit down with Snap to hammer out an agreement, difficult though the prospects looked because of PKR's view of their negotiating partner as a minor player and the latter's late blooming assumption that they are the preferred choice of the Dayak majority, said to be plainly fed-up with Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud.

Snap took the brazen stride of naming their candidates for 16 Dayak majority seats and then added another 12 names for seats they said they would like to go for.

This only served to bolster PKR's claim that Snap were being over ambitious while Snap felt that PKR is not duly cognisant of the reality that parties from the peninsula are inherently suspect in Sarawak, especially to Dayak eyes.

In this welter of contending stances, prospects of a seat-sharing agreement between the two parties looked decidedly bleak.

This was rendered more so by stories circulating that Snap were being funded by BN agents out to foment multi-cornered contests in as many of the 71 seats that are up for grabs as possible.

The agents' aim was to demonstrate that BN is a united force while the opposition is a hodgepodge of contentious parties.

Sudden injection of funds

Until late last year, Snap were on the lookout for fat cats to finance them for a run in the fast approaching state poll.  Suddenly, by early this year the party became flush with candidates and ambition.

Snap's sudden recrudescence and financial wherewithal looked suspect but knowing that BN are wont to divide and disperse rather than reform and resurrect, what is the point of complaining, even if there be good reason for it, that Snap are fifth columnists in the opposition fold.

It's too late for PKR to question the bona fides of Snap, especially if the latter is willing to negotiate and is not insistent that the 30-odd seats for which they have named their candidates are not their bottom line.

Snap are not inflexible and that leaves room for a seat-sharing agreement with PKR which must take the view that the parliamentary election coming up down the road is the more important test in which PKR must fare better than at the April 16 state poll.

Let Snap be overambitious now and, if things come to that, be forced to eat humble pie later on when negotiations are held for a seat-sharing deal come the parliamentary election.

Right now, the avoidance of multi-cornered fights involving PKR and Snap is imperative which places the burden of responsibility for working out a deal more heavily on the former rather than the latter.

Parliamentary polls more important

A united opposition front to face the BN is vitally important. This state poll is not as important as the upcoming parliamentary one.

If Snap does not do well in the state seats they are adamant about it, it will be so much easier to set aside their claims when the parliamentary election comes.

So PKR must meet Snap flexibility with preemption and foresight. Their problem is that they have more than one list of candidates and they do not like to reveal the final list until the last minute, probably because of fear that the bypassed would scuttle and join the other side.

If so, it undercuts their standing as the focal point in the opposition and detracts from the stature of their local leaders who are seen to want to check out their choices with PKR central whenever in doubt.

This serves only to fortify perceptions that PKR are essentially a peninsula-focused party and, therefore, inherently suspect, in Dayak eyes especially.

These perceptions will take time to counter and dissipate. Meanwhile, this is the reality which PKR must tackle with imagination and preemption.

 

TERENCE NETTO has been a journalist for close on four decades. He likes the occupation because it puts him in contact with the eminent without being under the necessity to admire them. It is the ideal profession for a temperament that finds power fascinating and its exercise abhorrent.