Is this going to be another “No” then “Yes” drama from PM?<\/p>\n
PM adds question mark over Samy<\/p>\n
http:\/\/malaysiakini.com\/news\/78082
\nFeb 14, 08 5:46pm<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi today fueled speculations on the fate of MIC president S Samy Vellu by providing cryptic answers on his election prospects. According to Bernama, the premier was bombarded with questions pertaining to Samy Vellu after chairing the Umno supreme council meeting in Kuala Lumpur.<\/p>\n
“I haven’t decided yet…maybe when the list comes, he (Samy Vellu) may not put his name on the list,” was Abdullah’s eyebrow raising response. Pressed further, he added: “I don’t know what’s going to be there (on the list), let me have a look first, so stop asking me because I haven’t seen the list yet.”<\/p>\n
Asked on Samy Vellu’s recent announcement that he would defend his Sungai Siput parliamentary seat, Abdullah conjured another puzzling response: “Anybody can say anything to the press, later on they do something else.” Samy Vellu, one of the country’s most senior cabinet ministers, has been the incumbent MP for Sungai Siput since 1974.<\/p>\n
Rickety ground<\/p>\n
Following, last year’s Nov 25 mass rally which saw tens of thousands of disgruntled Indians taking to the streets, the once rock solid MIC and its president found themselves on rickety ground. In the aftermath of the rally organised by the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf), rumours were rife that Samy Vellu who has led MIC for 28 years would be pressured to step aside.<\/p>\n
MIC also came under intense criticism for allegedly failing to uplift the Indian community, a charge which its veteran president and his leaders have vehemently denied. As pundits predicted Indian votes – which in the past were safely in the pocket of Barisan Nasional (BN) – to swing in favour of the opposition, MIC pushed itself into overdrive to regain lost ground. Within the party itself, there were calls for reformation with veteran leaders being asked to step aside to pave way for new faces.<\/p>\n
Subra’s intention?<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Abdullah, who is also BN chairperson, refused to be drawn into the speculation of the coalition’s candidates for the coming general election which will be held on March 8. Stating that he has not seen the candidates’ list yet, he added that even the heads of BN component parties were not guaranteed a seat if they were not recommended by their parties.<\/p>\n
“That’s what we do (party heads will usually be recommended as candidates). If they recommend their names, we’ll consider. If they don’t, we can’t force them,” he said. The premier was also asked on the intention of former MIC deputy president S Subramaniam to contest in the election rumours about a minister from Perlis being excluded from the state’s list. Subramaniam, who is Samy Vellu’s long-time political nemesis, has been rumoured of trying to make a political comeback following his defeat to G Palanivel in the 2006 party elections. Palanivel was publicly endorsed as the preferred choice for deputy presidency by Samy Vellu during a heated campaign which saw the MIC supremo lashing out at Subramaniam and accusing his estranged ex deputy of numerous misdeeds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Is this going to be another “No” then “Yes” drama from PM? PM adds question mark over Samy http:\/\/malaysiakini.com\/news\/78082 Feb 14, 08 5:46pm Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi today fueled speculations on the fate of MIC president S Samy Vellu by providing cryptic answers on his election prospects. According to Bernama, the premier was bombarded […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[130,24,225],"class_list":["post-1298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-indian","tag-election-2008","tag-mic","tag-politicians"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1298\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}