Ph Should Opt For Modesty In Tent Building

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From Terence Netto
As the differences between the stances of Rafizi Ramli and Saifuddin Nasution crystallise on the issue of the “big tent”, it becomes clearer whose position on the matter is more in tune with the majority position of Pakatan Harapan (PH).
By “majority position”, it means the stance of the “big two” in PH – DAP and Amanah.
PKR is also a big part of PH, but its stance on the big tent is the subject of debate within the party. The position of Upko, which is also a member of PH, is not deemed as determinative because it is a minuscule component.
DAP is opposed to the idea of a big tent for the simple reason that it said it won’t work with Bersatu and PAS, accusing both of having betrayed the people’s mandate through the Sheraton Move.
Now Amanah professes the same stance of not wanting to collaborate with Bersatu and PAS for the reason of the two parties being complicit in the same betrayal.
DAP and Amanah’s positions on the big tent are based on principle: Parties that betray the people’s mandate should not be trusted to work with PH in the 15th general election (GE15).
Rafizi, who is contesting the deputy president’s post in the PKR polls next month, endorses this principle while his rival for the position, Saifuddin, has adopted a stance of strategic ambiguity.
He says PH should aim big at GE15, that is, it must aim to win and that requires that PKR and the rest of PH should work with all opposition parties which are determined to deny BN of the victory recent polls suggest it is cruising to.
One would have to wait for the outcome of the contest between Rafizi and Saifuddin to gauge the popularity of Saifuddin’s stance within PKR on the big tent.
Meanwhile, Amanah chief Mohamad Sabu says his party is willing to collaborate with Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s Pejuang, Shafie Apdal’s Warisan and Muda at GE15.
Mat Sabu says these three opposition parties are free of the taint of complicity in the Sheraton Move.
But there will be hesitation on the part of DAP as to collaboration with Pejuang because DAP feels that Mahathir was guilty of tacit cooperation with the plotters behind the Sheraton Move.
There is a school of thought among PH supporters that Mahathir could have squelched the plot but did not do so because of his reluctance to hand the prime minister’s post to Anwar Ibrahim as part of the intra-PH power-sharing arrangement worked out prior to GE14.
Also, Mahathir turned unreasonably cold to the idea of economic and political reform which was the raison d’etre of the reformasi movement. This rendered him unsuitable to be the point man of the PH government.
Much water has since flowed under the bridge, making it sterile to rake over the embers of these controversies.
Also, with a general election expected to be held as early as before Hari Raya Haji and as late as August, when the memorandum of understanding between Prime Minister Ismail Sabri and the PH government ends, it is a waste of time to argue over how to apportion blame for the upending of the PH government in February 2020.
Suffice to say that PH should decide soon on what their position on the big tent ought to be.
Bearing in mind that politics is the art of compromise, PH should help its decision-making process by deciding what is undesirable for them and what is intolerable.
Working with Pejuang should be rated as undesirable and collaborating with Bersatu and PAS should be viewed as intolerable.
Mahathir was willfully ambiguous and Bersatu, abetted by PAS, was deliberatively treacherous over the Sheraton affair.
PH ought to proceed along these lines to conjugate a stance that would help them to forge a modest-sized tent rather than a big tent going into GE15.
There isn’t a lot of time left for preparation for GE15.
The little left ought not to be squandered on futile argument but used instead for the espousal of a clear PH stance on intra-opposition cooperation and composition of a manifesto of economic and political reform and national rejuvenation. - FMT
The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.

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