Lines clearly drawn over hudud Bill

The cooperation seen between PAS and Umno in the tabling of the hudud Bill will affect the country’s political game in the months ahead.

THE political battle line over the PAS hudud Bill is clearly drawn except that it is not between Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan.

Instead, the line seems to divide the Muslims and the non-Muslims from both coalitions.

It has caused ripples far and wide but barely a day after Marang MP Datuk Seri Hadi Awang tabled the Private Members’ Bill, it was apparent that the Bill is unlikely to get the numbers needed for it to be passed in Parliament.

The PAS president was quite likely aware of that but the Bill has been on the back burner for almost two years, and his credibility was on the line, so he needed to put it on the table.

His friends in Umno have also done the same arithmetic and that was probably why they eased the way for him because it is near impossible for a Private Members’ Bill to see the light of day.

What happened has changed the political game and the impact will be clearer in the coming months.

For a start, it confirms that Umno and PAS are much closer than most had imagined. In contemporary terms, one might say they are now openly dating.

The possibility of the two parties coming together to form a government one of these days can no longer be dismissed as coffee shop talk. It is not a pleasant prospect for a multiracial country like Malaysia but it could happen.

One DAP politician described the whole episode as scripted and he is probably not wrong.

The impact of the Bill has been hardest on the non-Muslim parties in Barisan.

MCA president Datuk Liow Tiong Lai is under immense pressure and he came out strongly to oppose the Bill.

DAP has challenged MCA to quit Barisan, but honestly, DAP leaders should look in the mirror and ask themselves why they are still in a government with PAS and PKR in Selangor.

It is hypocritical of DAP to continue condemning PAS day and night when it is sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with PAS in the Selangor government. If DAP is as principled as it claims, it should resign from the Selangor government.

“It is hypocrisy par excellence. Over here, you quarrel, over there you are together,” said political analyst Dr Azmi Omar.

The pressure will also build up around Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Azmin Ali. Will he continue to keep PAS in his administration or will he bring down the axe?

Azmin is in a tight spot. It is also hard to imagine how he intends to campaign in Sungai Besar where PAS, Amanah and Barisan are contesting the by-election.

“PAS leaders still cannot get over the way they were expelled by DAP. It looks like PAS is trying to get even with DAP,” said Dr Azmi.

One theory about why Umno was so willing to help PAS on the hudud Bill is that Umno wants to sever any future ties between DAP and PAS.

The two parties cannot go very far on their own but together, they were quite a force and they were able to do damage to Barisan.

In that sense, it was quite tactical of Umno to play ball with Hadi.

Hadi’s former press secretary Roslan Shahir had posted on his Facebook (Roslan Sms Corner) a picture of Hadi performing his prayers before leaving for Parlia­ment on Thursday.

The PAS grassroots are elated. They also feel vindicated because many of them had questioned the purpose of cooperating with Umno.

The timing of the hudud Bill has given Hadi’s image a tremendous boost ahead of the PAS muktamar next week. He will arrive in Kota Baru as a hero in the eyes of his party.

The last muktamar in Kuala Selangor resulted in his party being split down the middle. Party members were demoralised by the break-up and also at being forced out of the Pakatan coalition.

But Hadi can now face the delegates and tell them that the party is on the right track, that it has not deviated from its Islamic goals and that they can now move on.

It has also burnished the Islamic credentials of Umno and PAS in the run-up to the by-elections in Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar which are Malay heartland seats.

It is quite possible that the Chinese turnout in the by-elections will now be even lower than expected. The Chinese voters are in a dilemma because all the three parties contesting the by-elections support hudud in their own way.

Perhaps the most dire way of reading what has happened is that these two dominant Malay-Muslim parties have written off the Chinese vote.

The message from Umno seems to be that it can form the government without Chinese support, but DAP cannot form the government without Malay support.