KUCHING: The fight for the PKR deputy president’s post just gets more intense between Datuk Seri Azmin Ali and Rafizi Ramli.
Azmin may be taking the lead now, after his Sabah win, but Rafizi probably feels the final result can still go in his favour when the party’s Sarawak members vote this Saturday.
In fact, Rafizi probably is more confident about emerging victorious than Azmin because in Sarawak the former Pandan MP has Julau MP Larry Sng for company.
The latest results showed Azmin getting 59,195 votes while Rafizi polled 55,583 votes, to lead by a majority of 1,467 votes.
Now, Larry can make Rafizi win because his Julau branch has 13,000 members. And Larry sure wants Rafizi to win because they are both Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s men.
And without doubt, Anwar wants Larry to make sure Rafizi gets the 13,000 Julau votes, which was why Anwar’s wife party president Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail was in Julau on Tuesday.
Azizah didn’t just visit. She also announced a RM100,000 allocation for a road in Julau in the presence of Larry, which had PKR central committee member Latheefa Koya, an Azmin ally, crying foul.
Latheefa called the visit “inappropriate and highly questionable” and without mincing words, said Julau’s 13,000 members could very well seal Azmin’s fate.
That’s putting it lightly because this election is really not about Azmin or Rafizi.The fact is that the truth isn’t all told. The untold part of it is that Azmin and Rafizi are fighting a proxy battle between Tun Dr Mahathir Mohammad and Anwar.
That being the case, Azmin must win. Mahathir surely wants Azmin to win, meaning if Julau is a foregone case, which is highly unlikely, the rest of PKR Sarawak isn’t going to eat off Larry’s hands.
The fight for Sarawak votes can go either way, more so as Azmin has come across as a more refined figure than Rafizi, who had caused a ruckus in Sabah.
Sarawakians by nature have a soft spot for someone as cool and polished as Azmin. An Azmin win could mean that he, instead of Anwar, would succeed Mahathir as prime minister; while a Rafizi win could still mean Azmin would be Mahathir’s successor – but not before Malaysia goes through a political storm of immense magnitude. When this storm has passed, heads will roll.
