KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 5 — PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang today said that the Islamist party will support MCA’s Datuk Seri Wee Jeck Seng during the Tanjung Piai by-election.
He stressed that PAS and Umno need the cooperation of other races to keep the Muafakat Nasional coalition ticking.
“We felt in order to show how the Muafakat Nasional works, we needed an MCA candidate as we’re looking at this on a national level and at the moment it’s too Malay centric.
“It’s too much of a Malay majority and we need some representations from other races hence we choose MCA.
“So why MCA? Well, we don’t put all non-Malays in one basket. There are extremists and non-extremists. MCA’s candidate is not extreme and that's why we accepted their candidacy,” Hadi explained today during a press conference after the launch of Harakah Daily’s new website.
In a statement last week, PAS voiced its support for Wee as Barisan Nasional’s (BN) candidate for the upcoming Tanjong Piai by-election on November 16.
In the statement, Datuk Takiyuddin Hassan added that PAS’ support for BN was in line with the Umno-PAS cooperation charter.
Hadi also downplayed Wee’s opposition to the Islamist party's bid to amend the Syariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965, also known as Act 355, that would allow the partial implementation of hudud.
Hadi said it was only a personal opinion and that compared to DAP, Wee’s objection is non-threatening.
“At the time, Wee was not a partner with us and MCA has a right to voice its opinion,” Hadi said of Wee’s remarks in Parliament in 2014 where he called out DAP’s secretary-general Lim Guan Eng for not fighting enough against the law.
“DAP, who are in Pakatan Harapan, are fighting this law aggressively. That’s why the way we look at DAP and MCA are different,” he added.
