JOHOR BARU: The courtship between Muda and PKR is over after PKR said negotiation for the seat allocation in the Johor election is over. However, Malaysian United Democratic Party (Muda) president Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman is still hopeful in its discussions with Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), adding that it would, however, continue discussions with other parties in the Opposition.
This came after state PKR chairman Syed Ibrahim Syed Noh said its discussion with Muda was over after failing to find a win-win situation.
Syed Saddiq said negoations were meant to be internal and private.
“When there is no way of moving forward, we will inform the press about it. As of now, we will discuss it internally,” he said after the launch of the Pakatan Harapan and Muda election machinery for the Johor polls here yesterday.
He was responding to a question about seat negotiations that fell through between PKR and Muda after seats offered by PKR were not of interest to Muda.
Asked if Muda still expected to get seats from PKR, he said this was for PKR to decide.”Muda already has a set of seats to contest. We are trying to reduce overlapping seats the best we can so that we can focus on (defeating) Umno and Barisan Nasional,” he said.
Earlier in his speech, Syed Saddiq expressed Muda’s commitment in working with Pakatan to defeat Barisan in the Johor election.
“Wherever we can work together, we work together and if not, then we need to reduce clashes,” he said.
Earlier, Syed Ibrahim said its discussion with Muda was over after failing to find a win-win situation, adding that there was no meeting point with Muda despite many attempts.
“I gave a certain timeline for us because we need to move forward. I understand the need for PKR and Muda to work together where it is not the problem but we have to move forward and I cannot be waiting all the time.
“I would not say the discussions failed as it was open but there needs to be a finality and that finality comes with PKR announcing the candidates,” he said.
Syed Ibrahim, who is also the Ledang MP, said this after PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim announced the names of five party candidates for the Johor election yesterday.
He added that the candidates named included those for the seats that Muda was requesting.
PKR has named its Johor Wanita chief Napsiah Khamis for the Kempas state seat, Dr Zamil Najwah Arbain for the Larkin seat and Fakhruddin Moslim for the Pasir Raja seat.
Tebrau PKR division Chiong Sen Sern will be replacing Bukit Batu incumbent Jimmy Puah Wee Tse while Tiram incumbent assemblyman S. Gopalakrishnan is staying put.
Anwar also announced at another function in Rengit that former eEducation minister Dr Mazlee Malik would be contesting in Layang Layang state seat.
On Sunday, Star reported that the three seats PKR offered to Muda were not those that the party had its eyes on, which are Kempas, Gambir and Larkin.
It is learnt that Muda was offered Tanjung Surat, Sri Medan and Semarang instead.
Pakatan sources said both Muda and PKR were supposed to have finalised their seat negotiations by Sunday and that if Muda did not accept the three seats offered by PKR, then the party could be contesting up to 20 seats.
However, Syed Ibrahim said even though negotiations with Muda was done and dusted, PKR was still open to further discussion with the new party.