Umno-PPBM ties to be tabled at Supreme Council
BAGAN DATUK: Umno’s supreme council is to debate a motion on the future of the party’s relationship with PPBM, party president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said today.
He said the motion will be tabled at the Supreme Council meeting on Wednesday (Jan 6) on whether to cooperate with PPBM at the coming general election.
Earlier today, Zahid had said that 143 of Umno’s 191 divisional heads had agreed with a proposal to reject cooperation with PPBM.
“The motion was submitted via a WhatsApp group among divisional chiefs and I as the president have to respect it, so a motion on it should be studied and discussed at the Supreme Council level,” Zahid told reporters after opening the Bagan Datuk divisional meeting today.
“I hope the decision made would be acceptable to all party members especially the 38 MPs from Umno or parties in the government,” he said.
Zahid said the next general election should be held soon so that the country has a government which is stable to ensure investors did not shift their capital to other countries.
A general election is not due until 2023, when the term of the current Parliament ends. However, the government may decide to call fresh elections at any time.
Earlier today, Umno secretary-general Ahmad Maslan said elections should be held soon, as the current Perikatan Nasional government had “the world’s smallest majority” in Parliament.
At Zahid’s press conference today, he was also asked about a statement by Supreme Council member Tajuddin Abdul Rahman yesterday that Umno would cooperate only with PAS at the general election.
Zahid said the statement was made by Tajuddin in his capacity as Umno election director. “Obviously the statement was made after he had visited all states in Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah. I will seek clarification from Tajuddin on what he meant for it to be deliberated in the Supreme Council,” he said.
Commenting on a statement by Umno Youth chief Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki, accusing PPBM of “stealing and buying Umno members”, Zahid said it was made after evaluating the findings of a study based on facts.
Asyraf was reported as saying that each Umno member who joined PPBM would be paid RM100 while an allocation of between RM3,000 to RM5,000 would be given for each branch that was set up.
