'PKR's readiness to face GE15 depends on Anwar and me' – Rafizi Ramli

SHAH ALAM - PKR deputy president Rafizi Ramli said that a major part of whether PKR can move on to face the 15th General Election (GE15) depends on the president and himself since they need to work closely together to uplift the party.

“There will always be people who have different opinions and then people who feel that the party should go in different directions.

“But it is very important for Datuk Seri (Anwar Ibrahim) and me to work together as much as we have to try to accommodate as many opinions as possible but there must be clarity about the way forward, the strategy has to be clear, the tasking has to be clear and the execution of the campaign strategy has to be clear,” he told reporters at PKR’s 16th National Congress here, today.

Rafizi said after the plans were executed, there would be less politicking and less ‘noise’ as it was important to get to the stage where they need to agree on the campaign strategy to be decided by new leadership, tasks and execution.

“(Because) only then are we able to bring everyone to focus on the general election and so long as we don’t start doing that, then people have nothing else but to comment.

“My view has always been that you are better off to go and do something but of course we have to wait for the new leadership to start and hopefully that will be completed in the next two to three weeks,” he said.

He added that once they have started, the public would see more cohesion in the way PKR carried themselves.

Rafizi also reminded the new leadership and PKR members not to suck up to the president of the party in every matter as he opined that is when the problem arose as the president is not able to be criticised.

"What is important is that the party and the new leadership do not try too hard to ‘bodek’ (suck up) Anwar or defend him.

“Anwar is Anwar... he does not need to be defended. I will not be playing that role,” he added.

In another development, when asked about the party’s congress this year, he opined that it was a good morale booster because they had not been able to hold a physical congress for the last three years.

“The last physical congress was in 2018 and that was leading to the Sheraton Move so it was quite hideous and then we had two virtual congresses.

“And the last two years we have Sheraton, we lost election after election and this was the first congress that everyone could come together with and there is going to be a new leadership, so for whatever it’s worth it certainly brings up the energy and excitement that we have not seen since 2018,” he said.

He also added that the congress was done at the right time as the general election was just a few months away.