The inaugural Umno presidential debate saw Khairy Jamaluddin outshining his opponents Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and Ahmad Zahid Hamidi with his quick retorts and a rare show of humility.

Khairy drew first blood right off the bat by declaring that his mission was to fix what ailed the party adding he ruled out coming back to power through any “backdoor deals”.

This was an obvious reference to recent statements by Tengku Razaleigh and Zahid, both of whom had claimed that under their helm, Umno would be back in power even before the next general election. They did not detail how.

Asked by debate moderator Kamarul Bahrin whether they had what it took to be a shadow prime minister, Zahid said he would take the “non-confrontational” approach in handling his former bosses Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who is now prime minister, and Anwar Ibrahim, the so-called prime minister-in-waiting.

Tengku Razaleigh responded by stating that if he was given the mandate to renew and cleanse Umno, he would free it from the clutches of corruption so that the party could face anyone, including Mahathir and Anwar.

Following this, Khairy said his aspiration was to prepare Umno to be led by a younger cadre of leaders who will be able to draw people to the party for their ideas.

Telling the truth

To a question on whether Umno’s leaders and not the party were to blame for the party’s recent electoral loss, Khairy concurred and claimed that his mistake was not telling top party leaders the bitter truth.

He said the party had a long-standing yet damaging practice of protecting the party president and by preventing the position from being challenged or by delaying presidential elections, practices which he said must be done away with.

“Don’t give the party president immunity […] tell the truth even if it hurts. I don’t want to be a president to those who are not truthful to me. The party president is a president for the members,” Khairy said.

Zahid, however, said that the “reality” was that the party’s performance had been “baik” (good). He said this was because, to him, the party had 45 percent of the popular vote which implied that it was their partners in BN which had failed.

He further suggested that the party’s loss was also due to internal sabotage because the party had ignored grassroots sentiment on the choice of candidates.

As for Tengku Razaleigh, he conceded that some leaders were to blame, though not all. He said some of these party leaders lived beyond their means and were disconnected from the voters. He also cited examples of how Umno leaders would flout traffic laws and avoid being fined.

"When they are stopped, they don't care [...] they find ways to get off the hook. Some call the top traffic police officer. There's a sense of arrogance (and they think) they are above the law although Malaysians are law-abiding citizens," he said.

Round four of the debate saw Kamarul fielding questions from the audience for the debaters. Both Zahid and Tengku Razaleigh floundered when it came to a question on the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

After meandering for a while, Zahid reiterated that technology could help achieve the previous government’s target of creating 125,000 Quran memorisers in 2050.

Khairy, meanwhile, responded by stating his vision for Malay technologists and the need to move away from the long-standing goal of just creating Malay professionals.

KJ's biggest regret

To a question on why he supported the previous government's ruling on the 1MDB affair despite having spoken out about it in the past, the incumbent Umno Youth head conceded that this was a mistake.

Khairy said Umno Youth had raised many questions before but in the end chose to accept the explanation from the Public Accounts Committee that then prime minister Najib Abdul Razak did no wrong.

“This was my biggest regret,” he said. “Those in the cabinet and at the divisional level voiced up about 1MDB. But in the end, we stopped (questioning). It had led us to this condition today.”

To a question on how to attract youths back to Umno, Tengku Razaleigh said he will give the youths the opportunity to prove their mettle just as how former Umno leaders had afforded him the chance.

On how best bring Malays back into Umno’s fold, Zahid again reiterated his belief that Umno had 45 percent of the popular vote and that the party could handle negative perceptions through the correct use of communications.

“People now regret not supporting Umno and BN. We have the potential (to bounce back) but the condition is that we must change,” he said.

Ku Li wants more than a term?

When it was the turn of the three candidates to pose questions to each other, Khairy parried questions into ripostes before scoring hits when it was his turn to ask questions.

For instance, Tengku Razaleigh sought an explanation from Khairy on why young voters had turned their backs on Umno to which the latter explained that even his two opponents had suffered at the polls.

“We cannot blame the people in charge for certain voter demographics, just like how we cannot blame Zahid for the police (voting against BN). Even in Gua Musang (Tengku Razaleigh’s constituency), BN fared worse.

“(Overall, it was a) total loss for Umno and BN. We must ensure there are no more major scandals,” said Khairy.

Khairy then baited Tengku Razaleigh with a question on how the latter could prepare the party for the next general election if he was to fulfil his pledge of being a one-term president and stepping down in 2021.

To this, Tengku Razaleigh said he might need to seek another term if necessary but would try to implement his vision for change within the party in three years.

Turning to Zahid, Khairy sought specific details on how to draw the young back to Umno. To this, Zahid replied, non sequitur, with “empirical studies showing that 82 percent of communication is non-verbal” and how his methods involved “social media” and an approach based on “relevancy”.

To illustrate his point further, Zahid held up copies of his election manifesto for the cameras. Zahid participated remotely from Bagan Datoh, Perak as he refused to turn up at the Astro Awani studios for the debate.

The Umno presidential election will take place tomorrow involving 165,000 party representatives from 191 party divisions across the country. Results are expected at 1 am on Sunday.