Its national secretary, Mustapha Yaakub, said by establishing a specific wing for veterans, their presence would be given due recognition as the group comprised 30%, or 800,000 members, of the 3.4 million Umno members nationwide.
“The existence of these veterans is not stated in the party constitution and some look at Umno veterans as an illegal entity.
“Hence, what we are asking today is for the party constitution to be amended to enable the setting up of a wing for veterans,” he told Bernama here recently.
According to him, there should not be any doubt over the presence of veterans because they were former Umno leaders who held important positions in the party in the past.
“We have a former excos, former ministers, former menteri besar, former deputy ministers but we are not here to hold positions in Umno. We just want to help because of our love for the party,” explained Mustapha.
He said the veterans were also preparing programmes to help strengthen Umno to face the next general election.
“As we are not young any more, most of the programmes we are organising are more age-appropriate, such as charity work centred in mosques and surau, and visiting the homes of senior citizens.