Voices of dissent getting louder, Pak Lah must come out swinging

KUALA LUMPUR, — Does he want to fight and stay on?

This is the one question that ministers, Umno supreme council members, newspaper editors, officers and supporters of Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi have been asking in the last few days. The Prime Minister’s emphatic statement last night that he will not quit and run away from his responsibility is not going to be sufficient to hush the doubters.
They want to know if he is going to sit back and take the almost daily barrage of bashing from Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Mukhriz Mahathir and Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah or is he going to fight back with dirt of his own.
They believe that if he opts for an elegant silent approach, the PM will be severely damaged goods through a combination of innuendo, lies and allegations.
They argue that if he sits in Putrajaya and only focuses on getting the reforms demanded by Malaysians during Election 2008, he could abdicate important ground in Umno to the band of critics.
In the last 24 hours, Abdullah has been told that he needs to get down into the trenches, fight dirty with Dr Mahathir and his ilk. Various groups have gone to see the PM and spell out some home truths to him, including the fact that if he does not contest the battle to win the hearts and minds of Umno members, his opponent could ferment an anti-Abdullah wave and force a showdown even before the party polls in December.
They say that even though Dr Mahathir is liberally mixing fact and fiction in his attacks against Abdullah, the grassroots will believe him in the absence of alternative explanations. The Insider has learnt that the PM is ready to take on his critics and will attempt to show Malaysians and Umno members in the coming days why those who attack him have unclean hands.
He has also asked other party leaders Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak to kickoff a national road show to listen to the grassroots and answer their many queries over Election 2008. But there remains a nagging feeling that Abdullah is not suited to fight a down and dirty fight with the likes of Dr Mahathir, a politician who thrives in confrontation.
The PM’s close supporters wonder whether he has the Machiavellian streak needed to go for the jugular. And this includes making public Anti-Corruption Agency files against Dr Mahathir and other critics, showing evidence of how institutions have been corrupted over the past 20 years. Is Abdullah willing to use all the tools at his disposal to destroy the notion of Dr Mahathir and Ku Li as reformers and saviours of the party?
History suggests that Abdullah will not use his whole arsenal of weapons. He does not know how and even when he fought off Dr Mahathir during the peak of their public spat in 2006, he was not prepared to release certain documents which could have been damaging to the former prime minister. With one eye on the resurgent Opposition, he may be unwilling to go all the way against his own party men, believing that it would only fracture Umno further.
Abdullah is also more disadvantaged than he was in 2006. Then he still owned a strong mandate and was still viewed affectionately by the party faithful. Today, he is being blamed for the major inroads that the Opposition has made. The grassroots want blood and he and Khairy Jamaludin fit snugly as perfect scapegoats.
Still, the ministers, supreme council members and others who have visited Abdullah in the last 24 hours say that he owes it to his country and party to make sure that he puts aside his inhibitions and expose those who are attacking him.

tunku : what can pak lah do?he useless leader, if he got anything against tun mahathir, just bring them out.after all tun mahathir already stated that sue him,charge him if the government got any single thing against him.
after losing 5+1 states pak lah is sending najib to explain to grassroot and regain the confidence.it should be him as the president not najib.PAK LAH RESIGN NOW.