Yesterday, Datuk Zuraida Kamaruddin began making her way towards the history books by becoming president of Parti Bangsa Malaysia (PBM). At a PBM national congress, delegates unanimously agreed to restructure party leadership with the Ampang MP taking over the presidency from Julau MP Datuk Larry Sng. Sng, who consented to the transition, will be PBM deputy president.
When it’s made official, Zuraida will become the only woman politician currently leading a political party.Yesterday, the 10-month-old party also increased its four MPs – representing Ampang, Julau, Tebrau and Lahad Datu – to six when it welcomed Segamat MP Datuk Seri Dr Edmund R. Santhara Kumar and Kuala Langat MP Datuk Dr Xavier Jayakumar into the fold.
In a recent interview, Zuraida, currently the Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister, acknow-ledged the negative perception some people have of her involvement in the Sheraton Move. She was among 11 PKR MPs who were sacked before the “Sheraton Move” which brought down the Pakatan Harapan government in February 2020.
This is herstory, Zuraida’s recollection of why the Sheraton Move unfolded.
“When Tun resigned as PM, we supported him as we wanted a new mandate,” she said, referring to Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who quit as Prime Minister on Feb 24, 2020.
“During the first vote, the support was supposed to come from PH. But [a majority of] PH MPs did not give him the votes. That is why he only got about 65 votes. It is PH which betrayed Tun and not us. I voted for Tun,” she said.
(PH is Pakatan Harapan, the coalition that made history when it won the 2018 General Election.)
Zuraida said the first vote was to decide who will be PM after Dr Mahathir resigned. In this round, PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim received about 90 votes but that was not enough to be premier.
Her critics believe that Zuraida, who was then a PKR vice-president, should have supported Anwar as he was her party president then, instead of Dr M, who was then Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia chairman (Bersatu).
“When we were in government, it was not even two years, and Anwar was pressuring and pressuring Tun to step down. And at that time, PH lost almost all the by-elections, and we did not have a power base,” she explained.
“We were new as a government, and we were learning the trade of running the government, which we failed – that is why we survived for only 22 months. We failed because we didn’t know how to behave like the government. We acted like the Opposition.”
Zuraida continued: “That is why we wanted to give Tun a bigger mandate so he could reshuffle the Cabinet and put things in order. There was a need ... to get rid of those with the wrong portfolio.
“Tun wanted to form a unity government, and he was going to appoint ministers according to merit and not party position or affiliation. But PH did not vote for him.”
The PBM president said that after Dr Mahathir lost the vote, he told everyone to give laluan [way] to Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyi-ddin Yassin to be Prime Minister – “We followed his strategy,” she said.
However, in the second round of voting to pick a PM, at the last minute, Pakatan decided Dr Mahathir would be its PM candidate after all, not Anwar. But in a close fight, Muhyiddin was deemed to have the numbers, not Dr Mahathir or Anwar.
On why she and other PKR MPs supported Muhyiddin in the second vote instead of Dr M, who they had supported in the first round, Zuraida said: “Tun only became Pakatan’s PM candidate the night before the second round of voting.
“He made that decision last minute. And on the day of the voting, we had already submitted our declaration, and they [PH] started calling us, so we decided whether we make it or not, we would stick to our original plan.”
The rest is history.
In herstory with Anwar, Zuraida said during PKR’s fractious polls then, the party was split between Anwar and the then PKR deputy president Datuk Seri Azmin Ali.
“Our team [Team Azmin] won most of the party positions but we were sidelined in PKR.
“We were having problems with Anwar because of his management of the party. If we did not support Tun [in the vote for PM], we would have been killed [politically] in PKR,” she said.
Zuraida contended that after Anwar came out of prison in 2018, he took the fastest and easiest way to become Prime Minister.
According to her, Anwar should have first consolidated his party after the fractious 2018 PKR polls.
“I advised him, why don’t you consolidate and strengthen the party, and we will support you to be PM. To lead the country, you have to have strong party support. He had to do the basics, which was strengthen the party,” she said.
“What was upsetting for me, Anwar was part of the PH government, and he wanted to be PM in waiting, but he didn’t help the government of the day.”
Zuraida continued: “We told him if you think we are going to [politically] kill you, we would have put a candidate against you as PKR president.
“But we decided to let you win uncontested. It shows we still respect your leadership.”
On why she joined Bersatu after the Sheraton Move, Zuraida said after PKR sacked Team Azmin, its members decided to give strength to the leading party in government, which was Bersatu.
However, after being with Bersatu for almost a year, Zuraida found that her PKR grassroots were not capitalised on and utilised.
“Bersatu could not accept them. We felt so unwelcome, unused and redundant,” she said.
On how history will judge her based on the Sheraton Move, the three-times Ampang MP said she hopes judgement will be based on her performance.
“My 20 years of reformasi with PKR. We were a street protest party, and we sacrificed for 20 years,” she said, saying that Anwar sidelined Team Azmin members for other leaders who she called toxic or ineffective.
“It was us who mobilised the people. Our team won in the party polls, but they did not want us.
“I want history to judge me as a woman Opposition leader and as a minister,” she said, referring to her time as PKR women chief.
“It does not matter where I am, in Opposition or government, I sincerely want to serve the country and the rakyat.”
And that’s the PBM president’s herstory.
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