Since his unceremonious exit from the corridors of power more than two decades ago, the dream of becoming prime minister continues to elude him.

After the last general election in 2018, Anwar Ibrahim appeared to have one foot in the nation’s most powerful office before Dr Mahathir Mohamad shut the door, again.

For the 15th general election (GE15), the Pakatan Harapan chairperson has decided to stake his political fortunes on the voters in Tambun, Perak, some 300km from his current seat in Port Dickson, Negeri Sembilan.

This could be the 75-year-old politician’s final shot at the premiership and it comes at a point when Harapan supporters are still in the throes of disillusionment due to the collapse of the coalition’s government after a brief 22 months in power.

To ensure that the sun does not set on his political career and to energise the ground, Anwar is heading to the Silver State tomorrow for a series of programmes with voters of all races, covering a total distance of 62km.

Realising what is at stake, it appears that he does not want to waste time.

After meeting the election machinery in the Manjoi state constituency, which falls under the Tambun parliamentary seat, the PKR president will head to Chemor.

At noon, he will participate in a “Lei Cha” festival together with DAP in Sg Kanthan. Lei Cha is a traditional Hakka dish made from tea leaves and rice, and he will be hoping to score gastronomic points with the Chinese voters.

An hour later, he will perform the Zohor prayers at Masjid Chemor. From there, Anwar will head to a community hall for a programme with retired military personnel at 2pm.

At 3pm, Anwar will meet and greet residents in Taman Chepor Jaya. This will be followed by the Asar prayers and a brief rest.

Following this, the opposition leader, who is fond of rendering old Tamil songs at ceramah, will embark on a charm offensive to win over Indian voters at a Deepavali programme in Hulu Kinta.

After announcing that he will contest the Tambun seat at the Harapan convention in Ipoh on Oct 20, Anwar conceded that it will be a difficult battle.

However, he vowed to capture the seat and declared Perak as the frontline state in Harapan’s crusade.

If he succeeds in becoming the next prime minister, Anwar vowed to forgo his salary and allowances, trim the size of the cabinet and slash the salaries of his ministers.

The Tambun incumbent is former Perak menteri besar and Bersatu deputy president Ahmad Faizal Azumu, who was part of Harapan prior to Bersatu collaborating with defectors from PKR as well as Umno and PAS to engineer the Harapan government’s downfall in 2020.

Since Bersatu and PAS have ended their relationship with Umno, Anwar is expected to face multiple opponents in the Malay-majority seat.

Nomination for the 15th general election is on Nov 5 and polling will take place after a two-week campaigning period on Nov 19.