PN should discuss PM candidate but keep it internal - Wan Fayhsal

Summary

• Bersatu supreme council member Wan Ahmad Fayhsal Wan Ahmad Kamal urges Perikatan Nasional leaders to decide on a prime minister candidate.

• He calls for such discussions to be kept internal.

• The Machang MP believes PN should make it clear who is to be their commander for the next general election.

Perikatan Nasional component parties should discuss who is to be their prime minister candidate, said Bersatu supreme council member Wan Ahmad Fayhsal Wan Ahmad Kamal, but stressed that it must be done internally.

This comes after PAS spiritual leader Hashim Jasin reportedly told an interview that the Islamist party should lead the opposition coalition, citing its political strength compared to Bersatu.

“To go into an election, we need to have a commander. We must be clear about who is to be our commander.

“And the commander is also by convention the prime ministerial candidate. This goes without saying. Like (Prime Minister) Anwar (Ibrahim), he was the opposition chief. To be the opposition chief, the leader must be someone who can lead the whole bloc.

“The issue now is, I believe we can have such a discussion but it has to be done internally. We should have it, because if we do not discuss then we will have distrust and differences that are taken outside, which is unnecessary.

“But I respect Hashim’s opinion, I have no problem with it. Just that this should be discussed internally,” Fayhsal said when contacted today.

Earlier today, Hashim was quoted by Utusan Malaysia saying that there has been no discussion between PAS and Bersatu about their prime minister candidate.

According to the PAS leader, a recent announcement by a Bersatu leader naming Muhyiddin as PN’s prime ministerial candidate was made without consulting PAS.

He also reportedly told the newspaper interview that PAS grassroots members are holding high hopes to see the party leading the country given the wider support they have than Bersatu.

However, Hashim also said such a decision should not be made single-handedly by PAS and has to be discussed thoroughly among PN parties.

For the record, PAS has 43 parliamentary seats in the Dewan Rakyat to Bersatu’s 25.

Strategy and pragmatism

Adding further, Fayhsal believed that the message Hashim wanted to send across in the interview was that PAS wanted PN to discuss the matter and find the best solution.

The Machang MP also expressed his optimism that PAS will continue to be pragmatic as it had done before when PAS proposed Bersatu’s Hamzah Zainudin to lead the opposition bloc.

Fayhsal said many people do not know that it was PAS that decided to name Hamzah, and this showed that PAS is a party that has strategy and pragmatism.

“Whether our PM candidate comes from PAS or Bersatu is a secondary issue. To me, I see that what Hashim wanted to send across is a message calling for Bersatu and all PN component parties to sit down and discuss.

“PAS might even propose a PM candidate from Bersatu, wallahualam, I do not know. This is my hunch from the time when Hamzah was chosen to be the opposition chief.”

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