The Malaysian Insight

THE majority of Barisan Nasional (BN) Members of Parliament have rejected Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s proposal to withdraw support for Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s administration, said party sources.

The sources who attended a meeting in Kuala Lumpur last night said only four lawmakers agreed with the BN chairman’s idea.

Apart from Zahid, the others who wanted out of the federal government were former prime minister and Pekan MP Najib Razak,  Umno secretary-general and Pontian MP Ahmad Maslan, and Machang MP Ahmad Jazlan Yaakub.

Jazlan did not attend last night’s meeting but had already made clear his stand not to support Perikatan Nasional (PN) on January 9, said a source.

“All disagreed except Zahid, Ahmad Maslan, Najib Razak and Ahmad Jazlan. They were the only ones who agreed,” a source who did not want to be named told The Malaysian Insight.

The Umno president’s proposal was also shot down by lawmakers from its component parties.

“MIC, MCA, also disagreed… all want to remain with Muhyiddin Yassin. They want to stay in the government and continue helping the people, there is nothing else to it,” said another source.

BN has 42 seats in the 222-seat Parliament now, with Umno holding 38 seats while its component members, MCA has two, MIC (one) and PBRS (one).

Two seats in Parliament are vacant following the death of the Batu Sapi and Grik MPs, who are with the opposition.

The by-elections for these seats could not be held after the proclamation of emergency in January.

Together with the support of BN, the PN government has a slender majority of 113 seats in Parliament.

The source who attended the meeting said another reason to stay in government was to stop politicking while the country battled the Covid-19 pandemic.

The meeting with Zahid is believed to have lasted four hours and was held at Wisma Perwira, a building owned by the Defence Ministry.

Another source told The Malaysian Insight that Umno vice-president and Defence Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob acted as the spokesman for the Umno lawmakers who opposed the move to withdraw support for the PN government.

The meeting last night at Wisma Perwira was a continuation of another meeting Zahid held with party members at the Umno headquarters at the World Trade Centre Kuala Lumpur (WTCKL).

An Umno MP who did not want to be named said Ahmad Zahid and Najib pitched the case to withdraw support for the Muhyiddin government.

However, Zahid failed to give a reason for the withdrawal or outline what the party planned to do after withdrawing support.

“We asked him what the benefit from withdrawing was. We could not see any benefit. We asked what was the ‘road map’, ‘end game’ to all this. Zahid did not answer.

Another source who attended the meeting said some MPs who were supposedly aligned to Zahid were no longer with the Umno president.

“Those who had signed (statutory declaration) supporting Zahid before this no longer agreed with the idea,” said the source.

The Malaysian Insight has been made to understand that the decision to withdraw support will now be discussed at the next Umno Supreme Council meeting, which is expected to be held next week.

Several sources had said the majority in the Supreme Council supported the idea but they were not Members of Parliament.

“The Supreme Council can vote to withdraw support for PN but what good will it do, they can’t change the government,” said the source, referring to the fact the majority of them were not Members of Parliament. – July 6, 2021.