MEDIA STATEMENT BY PROF DR P.RAMASAMY
CHAIRMAN, URIMAI PARTY
Are the days numbered for political alliance between Umno and DAP?
Umno should not play hide and seek with the Malays. It might have embraced the DAP politically by being in the PH-led coalition. However, from the beginning the relationship between Umno and the DAP has never been smooth.
Umno might have entered into an alliance with the DAP for political expediency, but the costs of such an expediency could not be avoided. The two political parties were sworn enemies for decades before the emergence of the present political marriage of convenience.
Umno was once the dominant party of the Malays whose Malay support was garnered in opposition to the non-Malays in general and the DAP in particular. Over the years, it was this political enmity that conditioned the mindset of the Malays.
While Umno leaders might have accepted the necessary of political alliance but not the ordinary Malays especially Umno grasshoppers members. To date, Umno leaders have not be able to explain why the need to cooperate with the DAP.
It just not the historical enmity, but how the present alliance between both the political parties translates into the lack of support for Umno among the Malays.
In the recent by-elections, Umno was exposed as a party without the support of the Malays. In a more specific sense, it was political relationship with the the DAP that was the reason why Umno cannot resurrect itself as the dominant Malay political party.
This explains why Umno did not prefer the DAP showing up during the Nenggiri by-election in support of the PH-led coalition.
The lifting of the ban of the comic book by a former DAP member has not gone with Umno leaders. There have been calls to review the lifting of the ban. Umno decided not to invite the leaders of fraternal political parties to its AGM. The target was the DAP, but Umno made the move palatable by not inviting all leaders of the unity government.
What all these moves show is that there is no feeling of camaraderie between Umno and the DAP. While Umno takes the aggressive role to distance itself from the DAP, the latter prefers to be a silent partner in the ruling government.
The DAP leaders are prepared to put up with insults and humiliation ostensibly on the grounds of national unity.
The DAP leaders are comfortable with the their present political positions and the financial rewards that go with them. They are behaving just the way MCA and MIC leaders behaved under the BN administration.
I really don’t know what is the breaking point for the DAP to severe its relationship with Umno. The writing is already on the wall, the days are numbered for the two parties to remain together.
It is in this context that the possibility of political alliance between the present ruling government (with or without DAP) and PAS or PN cannot be ruled out.
