THE Shura Council’s decision to break ties with PKR is the best birthday present for Umno, which is celebrating its 71st anniversary today, said PAS Pokok Sena MP Mahfuz Omar. 

“It is like a birthday cake from the Shura Council,” Mahfuz told The Malaysian Insight.

He said Umno’s agents and the mainstream media have been “inciting” PAS to break off with PKR, and today the Shura Council has presented Umno with the “gift”.

Mahfuz, however, is shocked that the council has left it to the PAS Central Committee to decide on the party’s position in the Selangor government, which is controlled by PKR and DAP.

He said the party should have thought about the consequences of breaking ties with PKR before going through with it.

“They should have discussed how it would affect the people, the state government and the religion.

“But they are only going to think about that after making the decision. People are going to say we don’t think things through.

“If this is a wrong move, then it will be, as others say, ‘tahaluf fulus’ (money),” said the former PAS vice-president and information chief.

PAS has three representatives in the Selangor executive council and about 5,000 members holding various politically appointed positions on the state government’s payroll.

Almost all mosques and suraus in Selangor are headed by PAS leaders and supporters. Such an arrangement has enabled PAS to spread its teachings through lectures held at the religious centres.

Earlier this evening, Shura Council secretary Nik Muhammad Zawawi Salleh announced the decision to sever ties with PKR.

PAS delegates from around the country had called for the relationship to be severed even before the party’s recently concluded muktamar in Kedah. – May 11, 2017.