PENANG today became the first opposition state to unveil a Pakatan Harapan state leadership line-up.

The line-up was announced late this afternoon by Penang Chief Minister and DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, who chairs the state coalition.

His deputies are the state chairmen of the component parties – Mansor Othman (PKR), Chow Kon Yeow (DAP), Dr Mujahid Yusof Rawa (Amanah) and Marzuki Yahya (Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia).

“Penang is the first Pakatan state in Malaysia. We welcome our additional family member Bersatu with open arms and hearts.

“We have known many of the people in Bersatu for a long time, but back then they were still on the other side. After being rivals, we have become allies. That should make it easier for us to be good friends,” he said.

Lim said Bersatu, founded by former Umno leaders Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Muhyiddin Yassin, was with Pakatan to fight corruption and enable justice to be done in the matter of the 1Malaysia Development Bhd scandal.

“With all of us together, the journey to Putrajaya should also be easier now,” he said at Penang DAP headquarters.

The announcement comes about two weeks after the Pakatan national leadership unveiled its leadership council, with the chair going to Dr Mahathir, who is Bersatu chairman.

Mujahid, who is also Amanah vice-president, said Penang was always the swiftest to respond to developments in the Pakatan coalition.

“After we launched the first Pakatan pact at the national level in September 2015, CM (Lim) announced the state-level launch the very next day.

“Penang was first in declaring the 2015 version of Pakatan. Today, Penang is first again in officially declaring the new Pakatan version 2017,” he said.

In 2015, Pakatan consisted of DAP, PKR and PAS splinter party, Amanah. The pact was formed after Pakatan Rakyat collapsed in mid-2015, following PAS’ decision to break ties with DAP.

Apart from PAS-ruled Kelantan, Selangor is the only other state government held by former Pakatan Rakyat component parties. 

Recently Selangor Menteri Besar Mohamed Azmin Ali said his state was still a Pakatan Rakyat government as the govenrment must respect the 2013 general election mandate from the people. There are three PAS excos in the Selangor government.

Meanwhile, Marzuki said it had not been easy for the four parties to come together as they had to put aside their ideological differences and interests, as well as face attacks and threats for doing so.

He vowed that Bersatu would work hard with its allies to go into Umno seats and defeat the BN lynchpin party to pave Pakatan’s way to Putrajaya.

Mansor quipped that Umno and Barisan Nasional should be having sleepless nights now because they never expected the Pakatan pact to take off.

The Penang Pakatan leadership line-up was decided in the state coalition’s first official meeting on July 23 and approved by the central leadership the following day in a meeting at Parliament.

Others included in the line-up are Wong Hon Wai (secretary), Jagdeep Singh Deo (treasurer) and Lim Siew Khim (women wing chief) of DAP, and Dr Afif Bahardin (youth wing chief and information chief) and Mustapha Kamal (election machinery director) of PKR.

Penang Pakatan has also fixed September 24 to hold its first convention at the Seberang Prai Arena in Seberang Jaya.

Chow, who also heads the Penang Pakatan manifesto committee, said the convention would move things along for the coalition in its preparations to face the general election. – July 27, 2017.