PUTRAJAYA — Pakatan Harapan (PH) will set up a special body that will coordinate all government-related work, Prime Minister cum PH chairman Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said.
He said the setting up of such a special body was vital to ensure that all actions taken by the government would be well-coordinated and not seen to be contradictory to one another.
“So far, we found that the people have insufficient information about what the government is doing because there are no integrated and coordinated explanations from us (government).
“That is why our meeting today decided that a special body needs to be set up to answer all allegations made against the PH since the formation of the new government,” he told a press conference after chairing the PH Presidential Council meeting at the Perdana Leadership Foundation here today.
Dr Mahathir said among the things that needed explanations were the facts that PH had been able to implement various policies that benefitted the people despite many quarters being sceptical about it.
“Actually, there are so many success stories that we have created and all that will be listed out by this special body,” he said.
On the upcoming Semenyih state by-election, Dr Mahathir said PH was convinced that it could retain the seat despite the speculation that the Malay support for the government had weakened.
The prime minister said the failure of PH in fulfilling its manifesto had not given major impact as the people were aware of certain constraints faced by the government.
“Many of the pledges in the manifesto have actually been fulfilled except those that require some amendments to the Constitution, such as to limit to two-term the tenure for prime ministers and to lower the voting age to 18. We believe that the people are not feeling stressed out by the government because we are not committing offences, such as corruption. In fact, wherever I go, a lot of people will come and pledge their support to the government,” he said.
On the survey which allegedly found that 60 per cent of the Malays had rejected PH, that Putrajaya was being controlled by non-Malays and that he was just a puppet, Dr Mahathir said it was not true and far from the reality.
“They are making fiction that PH is run by DAP and I am just a puppet…but I am not a puppet. That is just another campaign material for them,” he said.
When asked on the popularity gained by former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, Dr Mahathir said it was because of the government’s policy which gives the former UMNO president the freedom of speech.
He said such situation did not occur during Najib’s administration as detained individuals would be forced to wear lock up attire and be held in prison, such as in the cases of Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal and Maria Chin.
At the press conference, Dr Mahathir also announced the appointment of Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin as the PH Election Committee chairman for Semenyih by-election.
— BERNAMA
