Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak should not be seen as weak just because he seeks peace instead of war, said Communications and Multimedia Minister Salleh Said Keruak.
Referring to the call by Najib, who is also Umno president, to all feuding Umno members to unite and strengthen the party when winding up debate at the end of the Umno general assembly 2015 yesterday, Salleh said it took a strong person to forgive those who trespassed against one.
He said in spite of the harsh words against him and the hurt he suffered, Najib extended a hand of friendship to his adversaries when he could have easily embarrassed them by turning his back on them.
"Najib has shown he can fight and he can also be magnanimous and a gentleman, which is his true nature.
"Najib is prepared to forgive and forget for the good of the party," he said in his latest posting on his blog today.
In recalling the internal crisis in Umno in 1987, between then-prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and Musa Hitam, Salleh said at that time, Najib chose to pledge his support to Mahathir in the spirit of loyalty to the party president and in interest of the party.
"Although Najib has shown that he can fight if need be, he has also shown that he would prefer to not fight if that is going to hurt the party," he said.
Salleh said the problem was people sometimes made the mistake of thinking that when a person who was diplomatic and preferred the peaceful alternative to solving differences it meant the person lacked guts.
"They fail to see the positive side of things, which is the person is a gentleman," he said.
- Bernama
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