WARNING, WARNING – BIG MONEY TO TAKE OUT ‘TIN KOSONG’ ANWAR & HIS GOVT? – AGONG’S GOVT OR NOT, MUHYIDDIN & HADI HAVE NOT GIVEN UP – BOOSTED BY NEW POWERFUL ALLIES NOW JOINING FORCES WITH BN’S ANTI-ZAHID FACTION, THE STAGE IS BEING SET FOR A COUP LED BY MUHYIDDIN & HADI IN THE NAME OF ISLAM & MALAYS – WHAT SHOULD TIN KOSONG DO? PERHAPS HE SHOULD QUICKEN THE CORRUPTION PROSECUTION OF THE POWERFUL BUT GUILTY AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!

DOES PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang know something we don’t?

Abdul Hadi has predicted that the government of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim will collapse soon.

The Marang MP said it twice.

On Tuesday, Abdul Hadi told the Dewan Rakyat that Perikatan Nasional should not be blamed if Anwar’s government falls.

“(The government’s) roof is leaking. Their doors are wide open, and their walls have holes,” said the president of PAS, the backbone of Perikatan, which also consist of Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia, Gerakan and Sabah Progressive Party.

Hours later, in a dialogue in Kuala Lumpur, Abdul Hadi repeated his cryptic prediction.

“People ask when this will happen, this is a prediction. InsyaAllah, (it will happen) in the near future,” he said.

On Friday, Pakatan Harapan chairman and PKR president Anwar told the media: “It’s okay, let him (Hadi) plan and dream bad things (mengigau).”

Is the PAS president mengigau (delirious)?

On paper, the Anwar government is solid. In fact, Anwar finally has “strong, formidable and convincing” support from MPs.

Let’s review the political math, as politics is a numbers game.

Pakatan has 81 MPs.

Contrary to widespread assumption, Anwar’s coalition does not have 82 MPs, as Muda is not part of his coalition. Muda’s Muar parliamentary seat was won by its president Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman, under the party flag, not Pakatan. There’s also a feeling that Pakatan does not really appreciate Muda’s one seat. The party was not invited to a unity government’s secretariat meeting on Feb 7.

PKR deputy president Rafizi Ramli explained Muda’s absence by saying:

“While Muda is (supporting) the unity government, the meeting only involved parties with three or more MPs, and these are the signatories (of the agreement).”

Perikatan has 74 MPs from Bersatu and PAS.

Pakatan 81 MPs – Perikatan 74 MPs = 7. Seven MPs separate the two coalition.

Anwar’s “strong, formidable and convincing” comes from: Barisan Nasional 30 MPs + Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) 23 + Gabungan Rakyat Sabah 6 + Parti Warisan 3 + Parti Bangsa Malaysia 1 + Muda 1 + 2 independents from Sabah = 67 MPs.

The numbers show that Barisan, with 30 MPs (Umno 26 MPs, MCA two, MIC one and Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah one), is the powerbroker. The politician controlling the powerbroker coalition is Barisan chairman and Umno president Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

Ahmad Zahid threw his and Barisan’s support for Anwar to be Prime Minister and was rewarded as Deputy Prime Minister.

The strategy or hope for Perikatan to bring down the unity government is for Barisan to withdraw its support for Anwar.

The political math is as follows: Anwar’s government 148 MPs – Barisan 30 = 118 MPs.

Perikatan needs another seven MPs to topple the government. The MPs can come from either GPS (more than enough with 23 MPs) or a combination of either GRS, PBM, Warisan, Muda, Parti KDM and independents.

But the stumbling block to Barisan ditching the government is its chairman Ahmad Zahid.

The Umno president reminds me of Hans Brinker, a Dutch boy who prevented a flood by plugging a dike with his finger, in the story Silver Skates: A Story of Life in Holland. If the Umno president or a new Umno president unplugs his finger, the government’s political dike might burst.

The plan was to challenge Ahmad Zahid in the Umno polls. The talk was that pro-Perikatan leaders such as former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob or former Umno vice-president Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein to go for the top post in Umno.

However, Ahmad Zahid killed that potential challenge when Umno decided no contest for the president and deputy president posts.

Is Anwar safe now that Ahmad Zahid will remain as Umno president?

But what if the High Court found the Umno president found guilty, which ordered him on January 24 to enter his defence for all 47 charges of the Yayasan Akalbudi money laundering, criminal breach of trust (CBT) and corruption against him?

Conventional wisdom says that even if Ahmad Zahid is found guilty, Anwar won’t sack him as Deputy Prime Minister, or Zahid won’t quit as DPM or Umno president as he hasn’t exhausted all legal avenues.

There will be the Court of Appeal and the Federal Court. Usually, these legal matters will be dragged till the next election (but Datuk Seri Najib Razak was one of the exceptions as he couldn’t push his case till GE15.)

I’ve been told to think the unthinkable and to expect the unexpected. And to think like a politician.

With Anwar’s insistence on open tender for procurements and approvals, politicians in the government, who ruled in the era of negotiated tender, are finding it hard to adapt to this new culture of good governance.

Also, what I learnt about politics after the 14th general election in 2018 is that some politicians are loyal to themselves first and to their party second.

I was surprised when Umno loyalists quit the parti keramat (sacred party) to join the ruling parties such as Bersatu. For most of them, it was about their self-interest and then demi rakyat (for the people).

Their self-interest can be billion ringgit of negotiated contracts, potential corruption cases or threat of income tax investigation.

It was not for the lack of trying for some who did not jump. But the other side did not want them as they were too crooked.

Anyway, back to the Umno president. Can Ahmad Zahid be persuaded to join a Malay unity government for the sake of the community or on issues like Mentega Terbang a controversial indie local film?

Can Perikatan offer a better deal for Ahmad Zahid? Can Anwar make Ahmad Zahid remain happy?

Zahid has replied to Abdul Hadi’s prediction. The Umnno president told the PAS president to change the government in the next election.

“That was a bad prayer, and as a political ulama’, he (Abdul Hadi) has his own ‘fatwas’ that only work according to certain situations. You can evaluate it yourself,” he told the media on Thursday.

However, there are more persuasive politicians than Abdul Hadi or Perikatan chairman and Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to persuade Ahmad Zahid.

That politician could be a wheeler-dealer with the ambition to be a Malay unity Prime Minister.

Is Abdul Hadi mengigau? Or does the hope of Malaysians lie in the hand of Ahmad Zahid?