The party’s Kuala Terengganu division leader Wan Sukairi Wan Abdullah was quoted by the South China Morning Post (SCMP) yesterday as saying that the parties were being cautiously friendly towards each other.
“PAS equals Hamas,” he was quoted as saying. “And Umno equals Donald Trump. The two don’t mix.”
“The friendliness is a new strategy born out of mature politics,” he added.
“We are working together for the sake of the people and Islam. That is important.”
Leaders of the two parties have over the last year presented themselves to be working together on issues related to Muslims.
Umno has supported a private member’s bill in Parliament by PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang on intensifying certain shariah punishments for Muslims.
Both Hadi and Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is Umno president, have also put up a united front in condemning violence perpetrated against the Rohingya people in Myanmar.
In May, Hadi was quoted as saying that although they had different stands, PAS and Umno were working together for “joint interests”.
“The cooperation today is mature politics, politics without any quarrels, politics that champion joint interests. In politics, one can have differing opinions but for any issue that involves joint interests, we must work together,” he said.
Later that month, Najib, in his speech at Umno’s 71st anniversary celebration, had openly displayed a growing affection for PAS which was the party’s enemy in the past.
He did this by citing excerpts of the speech made by Hadi to show how the two had and would continue to unite on issues concerning public interests.
The SCMP report yesterday said while the strategy might deliver Malay votes for Najib, it would also bring the risk of losing Chinese and Indian support.
It quoted Oh Ei Sun, principal adviser to the Pacific Research Centre, as saying that prioritising Islamic voters would “be extremely harmful” to Malaysia’s harmony,
“It would also inadvertently nurture a hot bed for misguided religious extremists and fundamentalists to spread their twisted versions of intoxicating ideologies,” he was quoted as saying.
Mohamed Mustafa Ishak, a professor of politics and international studies at Universiti Utara Malaysia, was cited in the report as commenting that both PAS and Umno benefitted through their cooperation.
“The issues of race, ethnicity, the Malay language and especially Islam are close to the heart of the Malays,” he was quoted as saying.
“By working together to uphold Islam, either through the implementation of shariah law or strengthening the position of Islam within the administration, this serves both parties well,” he added.