What’s next for PM Najib?

With the Umno elections coming, it seems that the political temperature in this nation is always on the high side although GE13 is long over.

COMMENT

Barisan Nasional’s victory in the recent Kuala Besut by-election is nothing surprising considering that it is their stronghold.

However now the focus of the nation is on the recent goings-on regarding the fake claim of BN’s Pinang Tunggal state assemblyman, Roslan Saidin regarding ‘Chinese doctors’ who have failed in their duty in the public hospitals.

Shouldn’t he be made to apologise for making such a frivolous and time-wasting claim when he was unable to furnish evidence pertaining to the said ‘Chinese doctors’?

The incumbent government should now focus on governing as there are many ills facing this nation namely the high crime rate, the high number of households in debt, the nation’s budget deficit, the ever-widening income gap between the rich and the poor and the ever-rising cost of living, just to name a few issues as examples.

Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak therefore must get down to work and focus on good governance, transparency and accountability, and the first two recent events that come to mind is the issue of the indelible ink that is not so indelible and too costly to boot, and the issue of top-scorers failing to obtain a place in public varsities.

Other issues that come to mind are the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) and Economic Transformation Programme (ETP).

Where are the thousands and thousands of jobs promised by the government? They always promise this but then once the hype is over, everyone forgets about this said promise.

These days the electorate have better memories due to the internet. And people will remember the promises made during the general election campaign.

The urban voters are now not so ready to brush off and ignore unkept promises and will take the government to task by reminding them of pending promises time and again, for example the reduction in car prices which has yet to be implemented.

But the main issue here is PM Najib’s performance in the 13th general election. There are many who are of the view that he had performed better than his predecessor, Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

However upon closer analysis, this is not so. He has to step up his performance by outlining policies with clarity and confidence and not coming up with ad-hoc announcements now and then in the manner of a fire-fighting exercise.

Bungling inconsistency

There are two recent incidents of fire-fighting. The first concerns the curtailment of internet freedom.

In early June, one of his ministers had proposed that Malaysia might adopt the Singaporean method of requiring websites to obtain a license. But then after this said announcement, Najib came out to announce that Malaysia will not be adopting the Singaporean method and internet freedom in Malaysia will be as status quo.

Kudos to Najib for making a people-friendly announcement.

Later in the same month, there was again some confusion about the Sedition Act being here to stay.

However in early July, Najib announced that the National Harmony Act will replace the Sedition Act.

All these incidents are unsettling as they show a flip-flop tendency and bungling inconsistency. A minister will make announcements only to be corrected later by Najib and this on-off, flip-flop certainly makes one wonder if Najib is really in control because the situation resembles too many cooks wanting to add ingredients into the broth when they come out to make announcements now and then when it is only Najib himself who should be adding ingredients to the broth.

As yet there is no clear direction set by the prime minister. Hopefully he is not being dictated to by anyone else and he is his own man.

Lately though, after the launching of the Battersea Project in London, he seems to have taken a slightly low profile and have let others run the show.

If this goes on, it may indicate that his position as Umno president is not that safe.

Who knows, there may be challengers waiting in the wings and they are now planning their moves and keeping their cards close to their chest – these challengers will only announce their challenge at the eleventh hour so as to avoid any pre-emptive strike or counter-attack on their plans.

Although Najib had managed to recapture Kedah, it was more due to the elderly and sickly PAS Menteri Besar, Ustaz Azizan Abdul Razak who had failed to inspire confidence in the voters.

One must also take note that Pakatan Rakyat has won more seats in the state assemblies of Selangor, Penang, Terengganu, Pahang and Johor although they lost by three seats in Perak.

Pakatan has won seven more parliamentary seats in the 13th general election and although seven is a very small number, one has to take into account the megabucks Najib has spent on the media promoting himself daily, internationally and locally.

Thus the best that can be said of Najib’s performance is that it is no better than his predecessor and these facts will not be lost on those who plan to challenge his position as Umno president.

As everyone in Umno knows, Najib did not manage to achieve his twin targets of regaining 2/3 majority in Parliament and recapturing Selangor, not to mention losing the popular vote as well which is a first in Malaysian general election history.

These failures could work against him in the yearend Umno elections.

Therefore the coming Umno polls in November will be the most keenly watched by everyone this time around.

It seems that the political temperature in this nation is always on the high side although GE13 is long over.

Selena Tay is a DAP member and a FMT columnist.