Of revelations and fake recordings

Tangled web: Shamsul Iskandar, along with Anwar and Ahmad Zahid, are the focus of theories and allegations made by their political opponents. — The Star

THE first time I heard that Datuk Seri Shamsul Iskandar Mohd Akin could have won the Bagan Datuk parliamentary seat in Perak, I was in an Asean capital.

I was having coffee with a foreign friend who had insight into the PKR campaign strategy during the 2022 General Election. She showed me photographs taken with key party leaders during the polls that saw Pakatan Harapan win the most seats – 82 – in Malaysia’s 222-seat Dewan Rakyat. She also shared photos taken with Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim after the Pakatan chairman and PKR president was appointed Prime Minister.

“During the counting of the votes in Bagan Datuk, Shamsul Iskandar lost by a few hundred votes. He wanted a recount, but he received a phone call from Anwar telling him not to contest the result,” my contact told me.

I’m not the type who is easily impressed by photographs people take with prominent politicians. Even conmen, heretics, fake Datuk Seri, and bombshells can arrange to have photos taken with political VVIPs.

But this particular contact is – to use an intelligence source and information reliability rating system – A1.

If you’re interested, source reliability is rated from A (history of complete reliability) to E (history of invalid information), with F for a source without sufficient history to establish a reliability level. The information content is rated from 1 (confirmed) to 5 (improbable), with 6 for information whose reliability cannot be evaluated.

Shamsul Iskandar, currently the Prime Minister’s senior political secretary, has been trending on social media over the last few days after his “explosive” revelation of what happened early in the morning of the vote count in Bagan Datuk in 2022. The PKR candidate’s opponent then was Umno president, Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who was defending his seat.

Ahmad Zahid had won by only 348 votes against Shamsul Iskandar, and over 800 votes were spoilt.

Another A1 political source of mine weighed in on what happened with this slim majority and spoilt votes. Unfortuna-tely, it is a little too hot to write about here. Let’s hope Ahmad Zahid or Shamsul Iskandar will reveal more in a podcast or interview soon (though I doubt the former will say anything).

During that Apa Cerita podcast interview, the PKR candidate said, “What’s interesting is that Bagan Datuk only had about 60,000 voters. The [results] for other constituencies had already been announced ... but in Bagan Datuk, not yet.”

Shamsul Iskandar said in the podcast that he was determined to win and was ready to call for a recount of the ballot papers, insinuating that he could have won the seat then.

However, it seems that Anwar allegedly called him and told him to back off: “He called and said that ‘I am impressed with your hard work in Bagan Datuk’ and so on. ‘But Sam, we want to form a government. Zahid has already issued a letter to form a government’,” said Shamsul Iskandar, who is widely known as “Sam”.

As history books will state, Ahmad Zahid, the Barisan Nasional chairman, backed Anwar as PM, although a dozen MPs from Barisan had signed statutory declarations supporting Perikatan Nasional chairman and Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin as PM for the second time.

Some people are saying the Shamsul Iskandar revelation arguably confirms a cikgu/murid (teacher/student) relationship between Anwar and Ahmad Zahid.

Back in the late 1990s, the duo was on the same team. Anwar was the deputy prime minister and Umno deputy president, while Ahmad Zahid was Umno Youth chief. Team Anwar was against Team Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, then prime minister and Umno president. When Dr Mahathir sacked Anwar as deputy prime minister and Umno deputy president, Ahmad Zahid was charged under the Internal Security Act.

In a recording leaked after the Umno General Assembly in April 2021, a voice purportedly sounding like Anwar’s congratulated Ahmad Zahid on his speech, which had called for cutting ties with Perikatan and Bersatu and for Umno/Barisan to go solo in the elections.

The supposed conversation had Ahmad Zahid acknowledging Anwar’s role as a “teacher”.

However, Ahmad Zahid denied that it is him in the leaked audio recording.

“I vehemently deny the existence of the conversation, such as in the audio recording, or any conversation between me and Datuk Seri Anwar after the recent Umno General Assembly,” he said back then.

“This is a malicious and disgusting political ploy that only confirms the ongoing efforts to weaken and destroy Umno,” he said.

Anwar and Ahmad Zahid’s political enemies are now pointing to Shamsul Iskandar’s revelation as confirmation that there is indeed a secret cikgu/murid relationship between the PM and Deputy PM.

I wonder what my A1 source living in a neighbouring country thinks about this. Actually, she has told me ... but, lol, I can’t say!