Kuala Lumpur, December 10 – With his announcement that he will make a final decision upon his return from overseas, MIC is abuzz with predictions about the options party President Dato Seri G.Palanivel may have in respect of ROS (Registrar of Societies) decision to order re-election for the party.
Palanivel’s supporters are said to be divided over the decision. One group is rearing to go for one more round to “finish off” their political enemies while another group feels that the ROS decision should not be accepted but challenged.
Palanivel’s supporters have been having series of political meetings and gatherings to decide a new set of candidates for Vice President and CWC positions. This is because since the last elections much “cross-overs” have taken place between the two camps in the party.
Notable cross-overs are former Youth leader Datuk S.A.Vigneswaran and former Treasurer General Datuk Jaspal Singh. Both contested for Vice Presidential positions and were supported by Palanivel. However both lost and since then have been aligned to party’s Deputy President Dr Subramaniam. They were also part of the team that was pressing for a re-election. Surprisingly, Palanivel appointed Vigneswaran as a Senator and Jaspal was given a second term extension for his Senate position.
Some lawyers pointed out that legally, ROS decision is not final and it can be challenged through appeals to ROS or by way of judicial review in courts. Party sources said that some lawyers aligned to Palanivel are already in discussion about the possibilities of not implementing ROS decision.
Their concern is that over the last one year Palanivel has lost much ground in the party with his leadership style. Furthermore, twice he made firm commitments that this will be his last term and that he would relinquish his presidency by the first quarter of 2016. Both these developments put together have drifted sizeable number of branch and division leaders to the side of Dr Subramaniam, who is expected to take over as the next President.
Party sources pointed out that in contrast, Subra has been consistent in his performance during the last one year keeping in touch with party grass roots through his Ministerial duties and SITF (Special Implementation Task Force on Indian Community) efforts. Subra heads the SITF.
Will Palanivel challenge ROS decision?
It is doubtful whether Palanivel would opt for a drastic political path of challenging ROS decision. It would be odd for a Cabinet Minister himself to challenge a government department’s decision however flawed it may be. Even the opposition party DAP accepted ROS decision last year and went ahead with re-election.
Challenging ROS decision would also raise huge opposition for his leadership since a formidable team has crystallised within the party ranks during the last one year which had successfully pursued the matter forcing the ROS to come up with a decision in their favour.
Palanivel may have limited choices or maybe there is only one choice open to him. That is to accept ROS decision and go ahead with the re-election.
With that decision, Palanivel will have to once again stamp his authority as President and would make another attempt to convince MIC delegates to vote for candidates aligned to him, a mammoth task given his dwindling support in the party.
Failure to bring back his own Vice Presidential and CWC candidates in the party’s re-election would send clear signals that his leadership in the party may end sooner than March 2016, a time frame he himself had announced earlier.
