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| Vehicles were going in and out of Mahathir's home till 3 AM |
Saturday night's posting claiming Dato Seri Anwar Ibrahim got the numbers and could request an audience with the Seri Paduka Baginda Yang DiPertuan Agong caught the attention of social media and blogosphere for a usually quiet weekend.
It had Malaysia Today, Third Force, Malaysia Chronicle and PKR blogs reposted the article. The hits for the posting was in the 5 figures. Not bad in times blogs are not attracting as much readers as Facebook or other social media platforms, so the claim.
It certainly gave the Anwar supporters a hard-on. That should worry both females and males.
However, the bigger worry was the posting could hardened the arteries of Tun Dr Mahathir. The old man had long resigned to the fact that his time should have come during his second heart surgery at IJN. It is his rich children, proxies and cronies that are now worried.
Sources close to a security personnel were saying vehicles were coming in and out of Mahathir's home in Seri Kembangan, near Palace of the Golden Horses till the wee hours of 3 AM last night.
Counter propaganda
Not sure whether it was medical personnel, but the Mahathir camp were churning out counter propaganda to neutralise the impact of the posting like these two "cheap" fake Statutory Declarations.
Both Dato Zahid Hamidi and tan Sri Muhyiddin have since denied.
Zahid Hamidi went on to issue a statement to state he will not take a position for UMNO single handedly but as a team. He is no Mahathir.
Though denying the SD, the apparent boycott by Muhyiddin and most of Johor PPBM Division Head of the the meeting with Mahathir in Johor may have made him a target. Wonder whether he has any ulterior motive to update Police investigation on the viral Semburit video.
It is obviously an amateurish job which may have come from Azmin's Team or even within UMNO still comfortable with Mahathir and view his proposal positively.
Against that backdrop of such effort, one former UMNO Division Head was told by one of PM's Political Secretary, believed to be Zahid Md Arip that Mahathir had 126 seats in hand.
One can give only too much credit to claims made by Tan Sri Isa Samad's former staff at Felda who was saved from being charged by the court for finding his way into Mahathir's office. What will be his fate should Mahathir leave office?
Felda Selancar disaster
The least Zahid Md Arip was ensure there were sufficient crowd and arrange Felda settlers to stay on for Mahathir's speech at the launch of the Hari Peneroka at the Felda Selancar, Muazzam Shah, Pahang yesterday.
The settlers did not.
In his speech earlier, Azmin said Felda will rise again and confidence restored. Felda will rise under Pakatan Harapan. He received booed from the crowd but went to agitate the crowd further to say Felda will not be made a political tool any more.
Azmin did not make life easy for Mahathir to speak.
Repeating a past scheming
According to The Edge report, some 10,000 settlers were expected to attend national-level launch. The preparation was for that size but the video showed it was barely filled.
As political secretary and one familiar with Felda, Zahd Md Arip should have known the political significance of such an event. There was supposed to be a new excitement for the settlers.
FELDA new Director General, Dato Osman Omar told The Edge of a new initiative to be announced to enable settlers to generate more income and stop relying heavily on oil palm and its unpredictable market prices.
It was a slightly different method from the past was to be introduced involving long-term lease method. But it turned out to be an old idea, very old idea indeed...
Actually, the Russian Revolution had long introduced the commune system of agriculture in communist Russian. Raja Petra commented:
Malaysia will be merging thousands of small FELDA lots into one huge commune farm like what Russia and China did after the Communist revolutions. That would end individual land ownership and create community ownership, which is where the word Communism comes from.RPK further commented on what is really happening:
Tun Razak created FELDA, what the UN FAO called the most successful land scheme in the world, to give land to the landless. The Pakatan Chinese now want to turn the Malays back into landless Malays.Osman Omar would have learned of the Russian Revolution 1917 in Form 3 the year he sat for LCE in 1974. The commune system was adopted by communist countries and it failed. Yet FELDA wants to adopt it?!
A similar concept was introduced in Ijok, Selangor but what happened was the management company convinced the settlers to part way with their lands to a developer in exchange for homes and cash. Many more than 10 years nothing happened and it reached a stalemate.
The Selangor government sold the land to a developer for cheap when one consider the price of land has rose significantly in he area. Someone could have squandered away with some money and settlers should be getting RM1 million each are only getting a RM300,000 home years down the road.
Property sales in the area have plummeted and developers are facing a hard time to sell. With sales, settlers are going to get screwed again.
Even China have done away with the commune system. The natives of Sabah and Sarawak have been fighting against NCR communal land title, which does not help in promoting land ownership among landless natives.
None was lost yesterday. FELDA announced loud mouth Chef Wan as a Felda Icon. RPK commented cynically:
Chef Wan was named the 2019 Felda Icon. Meanwhile, thousands took to the streets in London to celebrate LGBT rights in the London Pride 2019 gay parade.His mulut is real cabaior was it misspelled the way around?
In the meanwhile, a picture of Siti Nurhaliza, her husband and Azmin viral at the same time yesterday. Could the singer, now married with a daughter, be attending the Felda launch to draw crowd to the event?
She could be singing:
Siti Semburit pandai menyanyi...That will not help Azmin. His big fan already lost hope in him.
Menyanyi lagu, menyanyi lagu Putera Mahkote
How does the number stake up?
What happened at the Felda Selancar certainly indicate both Mahathir and Azmin does not stand a chance of staying around any longer. However, what happened at grassroot does not usually translate to what is happening in the corridors of power.
Lets look at the numbers. The above infographic puts PKR at 50, DAP 42 and PAN 11.
According to a poster claimed by Azmin's Team as viraled by Anwar's Team, 45 are with Anwar and 5 only with Azmin. Before taking into account Azmin's Team version as told to The Star's Phillip Golangai as having 16 and the 50/50 will shift to Azmin upon him being selected DPM, assume Anwar's Team from PKR is 45.
Contrary to earlier talk of 8 DAP MPs will give their vote to Mahathir in the event of a vote of no confidence, DAP is solid 42. That make sit 87.
And contrary to Joceline Tan's claim Mat Sabu is getting close to Mahathir, all 11 of Amanah will go to Anwar. They have struggled long and hard, thus will not be dissuaded from the promise land of seeing Anwar become PM.
Joceline is an observer of politics, but a political watcher's view, who heard Mat Sabu's expressed his position in front of Mahathir's loyalist that should there be a conflict between Mahathir and Anwar, Amanah will remain brother-in-arm with DAP and Anwar. That makes the number 98.
Warisan is with Anwar. Though Dato Shafie Apdal is son-in-law of Dato Shuib Lazim, a close friend to Tun Daim Zainuddin, he has swayed to Anwar.
The common view is Mahathir entered Sabah and betrayed their pact with Warisan. A source claimed it was Warisan that betrayed the understanding with Bersatu for swaying towards Anwar. It is something the suluk Shafie is capable of doing. That makes the number now 107. Is the promise land of 112 to difficult for Anwar?
With Muhyiddin at loggerhead with Mahathir, what is the chances of him to remain supportive of Mahathir?
Muhyiddin was instrumental in bringing in the like of Maszlee Malek or Wan Saiful, whose Islamic ideology leans towards IKRAM and political leaning more Amanah than UMNO-syle PPBM. One should ponder on Syed Saddiq, who was brought into PPBM by Muhyiddin. The young man would find Anwar more appealing than Mahathir.
Muhyiddin had parked substantial number of people aligned to him to be MPs. Some will not dare to come out in the open against Mahathir. But some dare vote against him especially when the chips are down.
Is it not possible for Anwar to reach the promise land of 112 from the few PPBM members dare to cast against Mahathir in Parliament? Or from Sabah and Sarawak.
So where will Zahid Md Arip get 126 for Mahathir, his boss?
Supposed the PPBM and Independents are solid for Mahathir, the number is 29.
There are 37 UMNO MPs, 1 MCA and 1 MIC, but the official stand is BN will remain Ta'awun with PAS. The 39 BN plus 18 PAS to make 57 cannot be with DAP or PKR that is in cahoot with DAP.
Mahathir must get PPBM to leave PH to get that 57 seats support. He could make the number 86 seats, 26 seats more.
It take some convincing and promising to get 23 GPS and Lain-Lain MPs. He cannot get all but only some of them. Suppose he got all of them by promising the sun, sky and everything else in between he has no plan to privatise. It is still only 109 and still fall short of 126 seats.
This means Mahathir need to get 17 UMNO MPs to join his side.
To quote Malaysia Chronicle (in exchange for quoting this blog), Mahathir could move in for the kill but why would a party, whose 6 months membership drive could attract attract more new members than the whole PPBM membership, will want to join PPBM?
Whoever is courting UMNO MPs, Tan Sri Anuar Musa reminded that as a group, UMNO's position is clear. It will not work with the side that is working together with DAP.
In the meanwhile, Sarawak is said to remain undecided or in a wait and see mode. Judging from Dato Nancy Shukri statement, they would prefer BN if Najib is still Chairman of BN or PM.
One will never know where they will swing since the popular believe is Abang Jo is close with Anwar and Pehin Taib Mahmud was then close to Mahathir. Sarawak GPS should vote the side that could believably offer more benefit to Sarawak.
As far as Sabah is concern, before or after, they will be with the winner.
So which side really have enough number of MPs supporting them?
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It reminded of a past political arguments on membership in Indian parties some years ago,
Someone made the effort to compile the numbers. As he added up the membership of Indian political parties and Indian members of mixed race political parties, he was perplexed with the total that seemed more than the population of Indian in the country.
If both sides have got their SDs signed and compiled (not the fake SDs that had Zahid signed on the day he announced his return to the Presidency), there is likelihood that boths sides believed each have got the numbers because few MPs signed SDs with both sides.
If the money is US$5 million and half to be paid upon signing the SD with balance upon delivering of vote in Parliament, tolak halal haram, it is not a bad idea to be bought. Payment will be in off-shore accounts beyond the jurisdiction of PDRM, MACC and LHDN.
It is not a bad idea to take the half payment from both sides. That add up to a whole US$5 million. The balance will be a bonus.
If that is the case, Agong will pening to see many duplicate SDs. His highness should just tell the Speaker to do a vote of no confidence. Otherwise, allow Mahathir to dissolve Parliament and return to the people to settle it with GE15 once and for all.