Move to quit govt rejected

PETALING JAYA: Barisan Nasional MPs have told Umno president Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi and former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak that the option to leave the Perikatan Nasional government now is not on the table.

The two leaders were informed of this view during a meeting on Monday night that was attended by more than two-thirds of the Barisan MPs, sources said.

They said the meeting, held at Wisma Perwira, Mindef, was planned in advance to ensure that all Covid-19 SOPs were in place to ensure physical distancing as a big turnout was expected.

They added that Ahmad Zahid attended the meeting flanked by Najib and Umno secretary-general Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan, while the representatives of all Barisan component parties also came.

Umno had the most number of representatives and all its ministers came except for Rembau MP Khairy Jamaluddin who had to attend another meeting.

Sources said the three-hour meeting was conducted in a very calm and relaxed manner, with the chairing minister giving everyone ample time to voice their views.

“The Barisan headquarters (in WTC KL) was too small to allow for 30 MPs to be seated away from each other. As part of the government, we were torn between having a physical meeting and a virtual one,” they said.

“But since the Umno president kept pushing for his party and other Barisan MPs to leave Perikatan, we felt we had to save the day before things got worse.”

The sources said they could not afford to lose the confidence of the people as they did in the 2018 general election.

“We said it many times in prior virtual meetings, but the message did not seem to get through as statutory declarations were already flying around.

“What the public sees is that Barisan parties are playing politics while the country is in a pandemic and the people are suffering,” they said.

During the meeting, more than 10 MPs expressed why it would be untenable for Barisan to leave the Perikatan government.

Another source said the MPs were willing to listen to the views of Ahmad Zahid and Najib.

“Ahmad Zahid told us that Barisan needs to leave as he claimed that the Perikatan government is unpopular with the people and that even the Malay Rulers were allegedly not happy.

“We were not convinced. One of us told them that even if there were some unpopular figures in the government, that does not mean Barisan ministers are unpopular,” the source said.

“Najib argued that even if Barisan MPs leave the government, it does not mean the Perikatan government will fall.

“One of us then reminded him that despite his guarantee in 2018 that Barisan will not lose the Federal Government, we still lost the election,” the source added.

“Some of us also asked Najib where is the guarantee that Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin will not replace us with MPs who may jump to Perikatan from the opposition.”

Another source said that Ahmad Zahid and Najib claimed they had enough support from MPs in the opposition to form a new government.

But they could not show proof of this claim.

“The ministers informed Ahmad Zahid and Najib that leaving Perikatan now would be detrimental to the coalition as we would be an opposition group without funds for our constituents and the programmes for the people will have to be abandoned.”

The source also said that Ahmad Maslan, who is Pontian MP, told the meeting that Perikatan was giving out RM300,000 to all MPs each to finance programmes for their constituents regardless of whether they were with the opposition or the ruling party.

“We pointed out to him this is why we must be wary as this might mean that Muhyiddin probably has the support of the opposition politicians,” said the source, who is also a minister.

The meeting concluded with the majority of Barisan MPs declining to support Ahmad Zahid’s suggestion to leave the Perikatan government now.

On Monday, it was reported that Umno MPs met Ahmad Zahid to voice their opinion on the party leaving the Perikatan government.

This meeting came after he claimed that he had the support of the party’s supreme council to do so.