PAS SET FOR IMPLOSION: Will its fall drag Pakatan down or set Pakatan free?

The sleepy hollow of Pengkalan Kubor was where Parti Pas met with a great reality check, as to its position of being a political party within the opposition coalition of Pakatan Rakyat, when its candidate was soundly trounced by the Barisan elected representative in a lop-sided battle which indicates that the Islamic party is now in a state of distress.

Is Parti Pas set to crack up? Will there evolve splintered factions such as Pasma continuing to support Pakatan or will the party just die off? Will the present implosion witness the end of the Islamic party?

It all really depends on Parti Pas itself. In recent weeks the party has been veering in different directions until it has become hard for even the most seasoned political analysts to determine how the party's saga will end.

The ball got rolling with the Selangor MB crisis and began to snowball when the party broke ranks with their coalition partners of PKR and DAP and the subsequent defeat in Pengkalan Kubor in the Parti Pas stronghold of Kelantan shows the state of instability that has come about within Pas.

This is not meant to scare those who still support Parti Pas but there are already indications that the party is ailing and needs a real shot in the arm to get going. Only strong doses of the rightly prescribed medicines and tonics are going to get them going again.

Unity govt with Umno

Nasrudin Tantawi - one of Hadi's vocal loyalists

Actually it was prior to the run up to the 13th general elections that Parti Pas showed that they were on the way downhill. The party fared quite badly in the GE and failed to live up to expectations.

The main reason back then was that certain quarters within Parti Pas were involved in a shadow play of forming a unity government with BN-Umno. This made them a suspicious alternative to vote for by Pakatan supporters.

Following their poor showing in the 13th GE there started to emerge factionalism within Parti Pas.

On one side, the old guard consisting of its president Hadi Awang and spiritual adviser Nik Aziz were rooting for archaic and obsolete Islamic ways of governance, and other the other side, there was the springing up of Mohammad Sabu and the progressives or liberals within Pas.

This was really a scenario that was set to break out into the open and the timing was not the 13th GE as some analysts expected but in the saga of the ouster of Khalid Ibrahim as chief minister beginning with the infamous "Kajang Move" of Pakatan.

While PKR and DAP were strongly united and spoke in unison, Parti Pas leader Hadi Awang broke ranks and set an unprecedented move by naming candidates that did not go down well with their coalition partners.

This was the backlash waiting to be unleashed on Parti Pas as the voters of Pengkalan Kubor indicated in the recently-concluded by-election that Parti Pas was suffering from a chill miasma.

But what will work to revive them and get back their strength of support from Malaysians?

What will work for Pas?

While readily there is nothing within Pakatan's bag of tricks that is going to work for Parti Pas, it is really up to the Islamic Party to state clearly and factually where they stand on issues that divide them with their coalition partners.

A houses divided is set to fall apart. This means Parti Pas has to be given the bitter doses of reality that Malaysians will not have politicians reneging on their election manifestos.

What Pas is championing is really unclear and Malaysians of all walks of life dislike strongly the fact that they tend to veer in different directions from their stated objectives. Within Pas there is this dichotomy between creed and deed.

But actions speak louder than words and this is why the Islamic party is losing the ground swell of support it once held with Malaysians.

Parti Pas leaders have to learn to come clean and close ranks and learn to speak with one voice and be at unison with its coalition partners of PKR and DAP or find that they have to actually break up the alliance of Pakatan.

Only by facing up to the hard, harsh reality that if they want to be part of the opposition coalition, they will have to change tack badly and become dated with the issues of the day and the direction that Malaysians want them to go in order to gain their favor and support.

By facing up to the wishes, expectations and aspirations of the opposition coalition of Pakatan and their supporters, only by being compliant and adhering to the voters wishes will Parti Pas be able to survive this crisis.

The future of Pas

Hadi at odds with his own deputy Mat Sabu

The future of Parti Pas is hanging in the balance. The recently held 'muktamar' by Parti Pas was perhaps the cause of setting voting trends to emerge in favor of Barisan as there surfaced clearly the disunity and disarray within the political party.

This does not augur well for the future of the party and the 'muktamar" has also set the tone for either the party having to overhaul itself or face the alternative of going to the dogs.

It is incumbent upon Parti Pas leaders to reach a consensus and to be united solidly and to speak with togetherness and to state in clear and uncertain terms if they are willing to follow fully the aims and objectives of Pakatan.

Only their unfailing loyalty and obedience to either sink or swim with PKR and DAP is going to work for them now. By closing ranks and uniting wholeheartedly behind Pakatan paramount leader, Anwar Ibrahim, the party will possibly be able to save itself.

Other wise the possibility is to face the doom of oblivion. - Malaysia Chronicle