KUALA SELANGOR, June 6 — The only member of PAS’s professional faction to make it onto the party’s leadership committee now dominated by the ulama is considering leaving the post and even the party in disillusionment.

PAS land bureau chairman Mazlan Aliman said that he is not interested in party politics and only wants to carry out his duties well.

“I have to say... I am saddened with the state of affairs in PAS. I will announce my decision in a few days. Whether I will remain in PAS, in its central committee or to focus on my NGO,” Mazlan in his winding up speech here at the 61st PAS annual congress.

Out of the 23 central committee members, Mazlan is the only progressive representative in the party now; the rest are from the ulama faction or aligned to it.

Advertisement

In a Facebook post yesterday, Mazlan, who runs the National Felda Settlers Children Association, said that although he has been involved in PAS since 1986, the current developments in PAS were exceptionally challenging and “requires much patience”.

He expressed sadness with the defeat of his fellow progressives, calling it emotionally disturbing.

On June 4, the ulama trounced party progressives in a near-total takeover of PAS the party leadership, winning 22 out of the 23 posts open for contest in the Islamist party’s central working committee.

Advertisement

However, PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang explained today that there are still six posts to which the professionals may be appointed.

A day before the biannual party polls, PAS’s powerful ulama wing called for delegates to support its list of candidates comprising only conservatives or “professionals” seen as aligned to the clergy class, a move indicative of its intention to wipe out those seen as progressives from the central leadership line-up as the Islamist party heads into election this week.

It succeeded in getting all but one of its endorsed candidates voted in.