UMNO elected representatives are comfortable with the current leadership and there will be no more defections, said Mohamad Hasan.

The Umno acting president said Ahmad Zahid Hamidi taking leave from his duties will stop the departures of members of parliament and state assemblymen.

“I will be meeting with all the MPs. They (Umno members) are satisfied with the situation now.

“We must ensure the bleeding must be stopped.

“With the latest development, it has stopped. So we don’t expect a second or third wave of exodus,” he declared confidently today at the party’s headquarters at the Putra World Trade Centre today.

On Tuesday, bowing to pressure from within Umno, president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi announced that he will step aside to enable Mohamad to discharge the duties of the president.

Umno to date has lost 17 parliamentarians, leaving the former Barisan Nasional lynchpin party with 37 out of the 54 federal seats it had won in GE14.

The parliamentarians who have declared themselves as independents are expected to join Bersatu eventually.

Mohamad said their main focus now is to strengthen the party and come up with strategies for the 15th general election.

He said they will have to rearrange and restructure Umno in order to strengthen the party.

“Umno is a very large party and we must look into all aspects of the operations. So that we can manage and operate the party in an orderly state.

“We will be setting up a committee with the vice-presidents to address the issues.”

He said there will also be decentralisation from the headquarters to the state level.

“We will give the state liaison committees more leeway in decision making as there will be more communications between headquarters and state level.

“We will also give Umno Sabah full autonomy. We reorganise and rise again.” – December 21, 2018.