Urimai chairman P Ramasamy has warned Umno to consider the long-term risks of joining forces with PAS in the 16th General Election (GE16), including the possibility of PAS overtaking the party in Malay-majority areas.
While an alliance could bring immediate electoral gains by avoiding a split in Malay votes, Ramasamy said PAS could eventually overtake or marginalise Barisan Nasional (BN) in parts of the Malay heartlands.
He said PAS had given considerable room to Umno in the Johor and Negeri Sembilan elections because it knew it would not make significant inroads there on its own.
“For the moment, PAS appears willing to emphasise Malay-Muslim political unity and nationalism where cooperation with Umno serves an electoral purpose.
“But if PAS concludes that this nationalism no longer serves its political interests, it could revert more strongly to its Islamic political identity.
“There is always the danger that PAS could eventually overtake or politically marginalise Umno in parts of the Malay heartlands,” he said in a Facebook post.
Cooperation could give way to rivalry
Ramasamy said having a common opponent in Pakatan Harapan had been a factor uniting Umno and PAS, but success in GE16 could sharpen competition between the country’s two largest Malay-Muslim parties.
The former DAP leader said PAS, in particular, was unlikely to be willing to make room for Umno in its strongholds of Kedah, Kelantan, Terengganu and Perlis, where it had established its dominance following BN’s decline.
“The four states are not simply electoral constituencies for PAS. They represent the historical fruits of its long political struggle against Umno,” he said.
Ramasamy added that giving up seats in these states could be seen as handing back political ground that PAS had spent decades fighting to gain.
“The real question is how far each party is prepared to compromise without surrendering the political ground it has spent decades fighting to control.”
Melaka polls could offer an indication
Ramasamy said the Melaka polls could indicate whether the Umno-PAS cooperation seen in Negeri Sembilan was a state-specific tactical arrangement or whether it was developing into something broader.
Umno and PAS were previously allies under the Muafakat Nasional pact, which was formalised in 2019. The pact later collapsed after PAS joined Bersatu to form Perikatan Nasional.
In the 2022 general election, BN failed to win a single parliamentary seat in PAS-dominated Perlis, Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu.
The Umno-led coalition also failed to win any seats in the Kedah and Terengganu state assemblies in the six-state elections held in August 2023.
