Insiders say they don’t relish the thought of having Azmin negotiate for PKR if Anwar goes to jail.
Pakatan Rakyat insiders expect a lot of acrimony among the parties of the alliance in their negotiations for seats to contest in the coming general election unless the horse trading is settled before Anwar Ibrahim goes to jail.
They say Anwar is second to none when it comes to negotiating skills, but they fear that it is almost certain that he will be convicted for sodomy, given the Najib administration’s determination to put him out of action.
That means, according to the insiders, PKR deputy president Azmin Ali will take over as chief negotiator for his party, and they say Azmin does not command much respect from other Pakatan leaders.
Indeed, he has already angered some PAS leaders with a recent statement accusing the Islamic party of eyeing seats that PKR claims as its own.
PAS secretary-general Mustafa Ali, for instance, has effectively told him to shut up, according to the daily Sinar Harian.
Anwar, said a PAS source, must “sort out the seat allocation issues” before the end of his sodomy trial, which is expected to be wrapped up next month.
The sources also said the Pakatan leadership had divided the electoral seats into three categories.
Won seats are those that the opposition won in the 2008 election. The parties that won them will contest them again in the next election.
Popular seats are seats that the opposition lost in 2008, but where the candidates who stood there are popular and have increased their grassroots support since. It will be status quo for these seats as
well.
The rest are open seats. Here, at least two parties in Pakatan have equal chances and these are the seats that will come under intense negotiation.
It is not known how Pakatan will treat the seats currently occupied by defectors from PKR and DAP.
A senior PAS leader told FMT that he felt these seats should go to the parties that won them in 2008. “A party should not be penalised for the irresponsible behaviour of an individual,” he said.
