| We were sabotaged in polls: Abdullah |
Disciplinary action will be taken against traitors
7 April, 2008
KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysian Premier and Umno president Abdullah Ahmad Badawi yesterday blamed internal saboteurs for the ruling party's horrendous showing in last month's general elections, local media reported. "Although there are other weaknesses within the party, the main reason we lost was due to acts of sabotage by Umno members," Mr Abdullah was quoted by Malaysia-kini as saying after a closed-door briefing with party leaders. "The action taken by these members were most regrettable." The reports did not elaborate on the apparent acts of sabotage. Mr Abdullah said disciplinary action would be taken against the saboteurs. If there had been no acts of sabotage, which had robbed Barisan Nasional (BN) of victory in the 14 parliamentary constituencies, the coalition would have won the election with more than a two-third majority, he said. BN is now eight seats short of a two-third majority. For the same reason, BN would not have lost the states of Kedah and Perak to the opposition, Mr Abdullah said. According to him, the 14 parliamentary seats, apart from the 22 state seats also lost, were all previously declared safe seats by the party. He declined, however, to comment on the reasons for the apparent sabotage. Mr Abdullah said he will provide the necessary information to the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) disciplinary committee for appropriate action, Bernama news agency said. But he blamed former Umno vice-president Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, who has expressed his intention to oust Mr Abdullah as party president, for Umno's inability to wrest Kelantan back from Parti Islam SeMalaysia. The meeting yesterday, attend by some 1,000 grassroots party leaders, is widely seen as Mr Abdullah's first step towards explaining Umno and BN's setback in the general election this year. "I admit that in the last four years, the government under my leadership has not been able to fully accomplish and implement all of the proposals," Malaysiakini quoted him as saying. "Despite all this, the voters did not reject us and the opposition is not the government of the day."
7 April, 2008
KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysian Premier and Umno president Abdullah Ahmad Badawi yesterday blamed internal saboteurs for the ruling party's horrendous showing in last month's general elections, local media reported. "Although there are other weaknesses within the party, the main reason we lost was due to acts of sabotage by Umno members," Mr Abdullah was quoted by Malaysia-kini as saying after a closed-door briefing with party leaders. "The action taken by these members were most regrettable." The reports did not elaborate on the apparent acts of sabotage. Mr Abdullah said disciplinary action would be taken against the saboteurs. If there had been no acts of sabotage, which had robbed Barisan Nasional (BN) of victory in the 14 parliamentary constituencies, the coalition would have won the election with more than a two-third majority, he said. BN is now eight seats short of a two-third majority. For the same reason, BN would not have lost the states of Kedah and Perak to the opposition, Mr Abdullah said. According to him, the 14 parliamentary seats, apart from the 22 state seats also lost, were all previously declared safe seats by the party. He declined, however, to comment on the reasons for the apparent sabotage. Mr Abdullah said he will provide the necessary information to the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) disciplinary committee for appropriate action, Bernama news agency said. But he blamed former Umno vice-president Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, who has expressed his intention to oust Mr Abdullah as party president, for Umno's inability to wrest Kelantan back from Parti Islam SeMalaysia. The meeting yesterday, attend by some 1,000 grassroots party leaders, is widely seen as Mr Abdullah's first step towards explaining Umno and BN's setback in the general election this year. "I admit that in the last four years, the government under my leadership has not been able to fully accomplish and implement all of the proposals," Malaysiakini quoted him as saying. "Despite all this, the voters did not reject us and the opposition is not the government of the day."
No comments:
Post a Comment