The Stereotyping Of PAS Leaders

People like Hussein have a very low opinion of PAS leaders and assume that most are country bumpkins. They also assume that only fishermen, farmers and kampung people support PAS. They cannot comprehend that more than 50% of Malay professionals support PAS and contribute financially to the Islamic cause. 

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Australian blogger Hussein Abdul Hamid posted the following in his blog today.

Just like most Pakatan Harapan supporters, Hussein assumes if you are a PAS leader that means you are a fisherman or farmer and a recipient of a kampung (village) education. Actually, many PAS leaders are professionals and are quite well off by Malaysian standards. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, most of my business success came from contacts or networking within PAS because in Malaysia it is know-who and not know-how that helps you get ahead.

I remember back in 1982 when I performed my first Haj (that was soon after Anwar Ibrahim betrayed the Islamic cause and joined Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad in Umno) and I met the PAS President Ustaz Fadzil Muhammad Noor. I spent three weeks with him, Abdul Hadi Awang, Mustafa Ali, and a couple of other PAS leaders in Mekah, Medina and Jeddah.

Ustaz Fadzil asked me what I did for a living and I told him I was a businessman and that quite a bit of my business was supplying goods and services to the government.

Wise words from Ustaz Fadzil

Ustaz Fadzil then asked me whether I knew a certain person, and he mentioned the name of this person, Tuan Haji Mat — who happened to be the Secretary of the Contracts Division of a certain Ministry.

I actually did know that person since I was a supplier of goods and services to the government, and I told Ustaz Fadzil that. But this particular Tuan Haji would never allow contractors into his room. One day I tried to meet him and he asked me whether I was a government contractor. When I said “yes”, he chased me out of his room.

Ustaz Fadzil laughed and then told me to go and see Tuan Haji when I return from Mekah and kirim his (Ustaz Fadzil’s) salam.

I did just that. On my return from Mekah, I dropped into Tuan Haji’s office and knocked on his door. He said, “masuk,” and when I opened his door he gave me a huge smile and said, “Ah, Pak Raja, sila masuk.” He then summoned his staff and asked her to order tea and cakes and we sat for quite some time talking about PAS and the Islamic cause.

When I left Tuan Haji’s room, one of his officers gave me a military salute and said in all his years working there he had never seen Tuan Haji act that way. ‘Ilmu apa you pakai?” he asked me. That particular officer was also a strong PAS supporter, as was his entire family back in Terengganu.

Nik Aziz, like most PAS leaders, was a graduate and he said Kelantan State may be poor but its wealth is in its people

Basically, the point I am making is that everywhere I went (Ministries, TNB, Petronas, etc.) there would be many PAS supporters. They openly placed PAS flags on their desk and a person like me, who was also a PAS supporter, got red carpet treatment. I am not ashamed to admit that from the late 1970s up to the 1990s I procured more than RM100 million worth of government contracts. But I gave most of the profit back to the cause.

I estimate that I probably made at least RM8 million from my business but when I retired in the mid-1990s I had nothing left. But then there were many surau, masjid, madrasa, sekolah pondok, etc., all over the place that shared the profit I made. I also bought land and donated it to the cause so that they could build or expand surau, masjid, madrasa, sekolah pondok, and so on.

People like Hussein and the Pakatan Harapan supporters assume if PAS or the PAS leaders have money then it can only mean it is because they take bribes from Umno. I know one PAS wakil rakyat whose wife runs a very successful cosmetic direct selling business. She makes a lot of money and has been doing so for many years long before her husband became a wakil rakyat.

One PAS leader has huge parcels of land and there is gold on that land. The kampung people come from far and wide to ‘illegally’ mine that gold but this PAS leader does not mind. This is his way of ‘sharing the wealth’, which comes from God anyway. This has been going on for more than 40 years but not many Malaysians are aware of this. Have you ever heard about the gold mining in Terengganu?

Guess who owns this hotel in Bangkok, where I meet up with PAS leaders from time to time?

One PAS chap runs a successful petrol station and for three months in a year he spends all the money he makes by doing tabligh (missionary) work. They travel all over the world to countries such as India, Pakistan and so on and sleep in mosques. They put aside some money for their family and the rest is ‘blown’ on missionary work.

Most PAS people are involved in business because Muslims believe that 90% of rezeki comes from business while only 10% from working for others. Many lawyers, engineers and other professionals are PAS supporters and they give 10% or more of their salary to the cause.

People like Hussein have a very low opinion of PAS leaders and assume that most are country bumpkins. They also assume that only fishermen, farmers and kampung people support PAS. They cannot comprehend that more than 50% of Malay professionals support PAS and contribute financially to the Islamic cause.

I remember in the early 1990s when Mahathir insulted Kelantan by saying that Kelantan is the poorest state in Malaysia and Tok Guru Nik Aziz Nik Mat replied that Kelantan may be the poorest state in Malaysia but the citizens of Kelantan are rich and that Kelantan’s wealth is in its people.