GEORGE TOWN: DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said Pas president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang had obviously failed to secure consent from Pakatan for the hudud law.
He said the issue was no longer just about hudud laws or even Hadi’s support for hudud, but his betrayal of the Pakatan consensus not to implement hudud except under the conditions of getting the consent of the three parties under the Pakatan platform based on consensus, mutual trust and respect.
“Hadi had obviously failed to secure such a consent from Pakatan. In defending Pas’s violation of the Pakatan Common Policy Framework and Pakatan Leadership Council decisions, Hadi has now said that the Pas vision is not just 2020 but ‘the afterlife’,” Lim said in a statement, here today.
He said Hadi’s unilateral decision to table the Private Members’ Bill to allow the hudud law’s implementation was a final act of treachery by him in breaching the Pakatan consensus agreed by him personally during the Pakatan Leadership Council meeting on Feb 8.
Lim, who is also the Penang Chief Minister, said DAP firmly opposed the hudud law’s implementation not because it was Islamic, but because hudud was unconstitutional and contrary to the Federal Constitution.
“No one is questioning Hadi’s individual democratic right to table a Private Members’ Bill on Hudud in Parliament, but where is the right of Pakatan to expect honesty and trust in its dealings from Hadi?
“If Hadi is honourable and honest about his intentions to surreptitiously pursue the implementation of hudud laws in violation and defiance of the Pakatan consensus he himself had agreed to, then he should not have joined Pakatan but go on his own,” Lim said.
He said Hadi even twisted a joint statement of the Pakatan Leadership Council of Sept 28, 2011 to justify his act of treachery claiming DAP, via its adviser Lim Kit Siang, had signed that “agreed to disagree” about the hudud penalties implementation under syariah law.
“Let me remind Hadi that the joint Pakatan statement in 2011 merely acknowledged that Kelantan Syariah Criminal Enactment 1993 and the Terengganu Syariah Criminal Enactment 2003 were passed before the formation of Pakatan in 2008.
“However, Hadi should not forget that Pakatan adopted a clear position that while it was unreasonable to require Pas to abandon their agenda, the three Pakatan component parties would give priority to the Pakatan Common Policy Framework and their implementation must have the agreement of all three parties,” Lim said.
He said that was the reason why all top Pas leaders from 2008 until 2013 general election, including the late Datuk Seri Nik Aziz Nik Mat, did not pursue the hudud law’s implementation.
This was because hudud was not in the list of Pakatan priorities to restore freedom and justice, establish good governance and forge national unity among Malaysians, he added. - BERNAMA