Internal disputes within Kedah PAS led to the downfall of the PAS administration there, delegates at the 59th PAS Muktamar heard today.

Debating the president's address at Stadium Malawati, Shah Alam, Kedah delegate Firdaus Zakaria said that if unresolved, this "cancer" can infect the constituencies that PAS won in the state.

59th pas muktamar 2013 2 "One of the factors (for the GE13 loss) was internal disputes. If bickering children cannot solve their own issues ... parents must quickly step in to break up the argument...

"We don't want these internal issues, which are like cancer, to attack other parliamentary and state constituencies that we have won," said the former Padang Terap MP.

The one-term Kedah PAS government fell to BN in the 13th general election following several disputes between the late then menteri besar Azizan Abdul Razak and state executive councilor Phahrolrazi Zawawi.

Meanwhile, Firdaus urged the party's post-mortem committee to present its findings on why PAS lost in Kedah on an urgent basis.

He also urged the steering committee formed at the central leadership level to solve the Kedah impasse to reactivate itself to curb the fissure from worsening.

The presidential address debates saw several delegates voicing support for continued cooperation within Pakatan Rakyat.

This despite attacks on PAS that its cooperation with PKR and DAP has compromised its Islamic ideals.

Inclusive PAS

Selangor delegate Zaidi Abdul Talib said that in Selangor, cooperation had made PAS more inclusive within society, and helped it spread the message of Islam.

The Taman Templer assemblyperson said a non-Muslim man helped him tremendously during the campaign period and diligently explained how the hudud is fair to all.

In the Selangor state assembly, he said, a DAP representative was confident enough to take on an Umno counter-part on the issue surrounding the use of the word Allah by non-Muslims.

Agreeing, Johor delegate Firdaus Masood said that in the southern state, Malay votes garnered by PAS had actually gone up by 2 percent following  the cooperation withinPakatan.

"We retained Selangor and increased our seats in Terengganu because of cooperation within Pakatan," he said.

"If PAS leaves Pakatan, and stays on its own or joins BN, who will bring this message (of Islam to the masses)?" he asked.

However, the Johor delegate put forward several suggestions, including having a designated spokesperson for Pakatan at the central and state levels to stop "popularity-hungry" grassroots leaders from speaking to the media.

He also called for "separation of powers", whereby top party leaders do not also hold top positions in government.

For example, he said, when Abdul Hadi Awang was Terengganu MB, he was also PAS president and PAS state commissioner, and this might have contributed to PAS losing the state in 2004.

When quizzed on this by reporters, Hadi said the issue now is that it is party members who push the same party leaders to also lead the states.

"For example, (spiritual leader Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat) was Kelantan MB, but people wanted him to also be spiritual leader, then Kelantan commissioner, even though we knew he has physical limits," he said.

Meanwhile, in keeping with the inclusive theme, Hadi today also launched the Mandarin version of PAS mouthpiece Harakah .