Ku Li has always seen himself as PM material. Well, he could have had his shot had he thrown his lot behind Pakatan when they needed someone with gravitas to switch over. Turns out that someone was Dr M, always unpredictable even in his old age.
Ku Li, in contrast, is very predictable. He took a risk once, when he left UMNO to found Semangat 46 but once that venture failed, he went back to UMNO and has been conservative and predictable since.
Now, it looks like he might be contesting for the UMNO presidency. A few things immediately come to mind:
i) What the heck for? What is the point of being president of a down-and-out party that has lost the federal government and most of the states it used to control? If he wants to be PM this is obviously not the way to make it happen. As mentioned earlier, his one last shot came and went when he declined to throw his lot behind Pakatan. They would have welcomed him but he was too timid to make the leap.
ii) He won't be able to repair UMNO or restore BN which is probably going to break up (or as Wee Ka Siong astutely put it, BN only exists in name now). Ku Li may be a steady pair of hands, untainted by 1MDB and other corruption scandals, but he's not going to be able to revive UMNO (it's hard to imagine anybody can). UMNO/BN is currently too despised for it to be revived into a potent force anytime soon. We are looking multiple election cycles before that's even a remote possibility. So, it's a losing proposition.
iii) There's only downside for him, no upside. If he tries to revive UMNO/BN, he will fail spectacularly and that will be his legacy: the failure to revive his party. Perhaps this is why KJ doesn't want to go for the top post and seems to be gunning for the opposition leader post instead. He knows anyone who heads UMNO is bound to fail big time in GE15. Does Ku Li want to preside over the decimation of the party in the next polls? He will if he becomes the UMNO president.
Ku Li, in contrast, is very predictable. He took a risk once, when he left UMNO to found Semangat 46 but once that venture failed, he went back to UMNO and has been conservative and predictable since.
Now, it looks like he might be contesting for the UMNO presidency. A few things immediately come to mind:
i) What the heck for? What is the point of being president of a down-and-out party that has lost the federal government and most of the states it used to control? If he wants to be PM this is obviously not the way to make it happen. As mentioned earlier, his one last shot came and went when he declined to throw his lot behind Pakatan. They would have welcomed him but he was too timid to make the leap.
ii) He won't be able to repair UMNO or restore BN which is probably going to break up (or as Wee Ka Siong astutely put it, BN only exists in name now). Ku Li may be a steady pair of hands, untainted by 1MDB and other corruption scandals, but he's not going to be able to revive UMNO (it's hard to imagine anybody can). UMNO/BN is currently too despised for it to be revived into a potent force anytime soon. We are looking multiple election cycles before that's even a remote possibility. So, it's a losing proposition.
iii) There's only downside for him, no upside. If he tries to revive UMNO/BN, he will fail spectacularly and that will be his legacy: the failure to revive his party. Perhaps this is why KJ doesn't want to go for the top post and seems to be gunning for the opposition leader post instead. He knows anyone who heads UMNO is bound to fail big time in GE15. Does Ku Li want to preside over the decimation of the party in the next polls? He will if he becomes the UMNO president.
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