Within 42 hours of the meeting of UMNO Divisional chiefs in Kuala Lumpur at 3 pm tomorrow Sunday), the Deputy Prime Minister and UMNO Deputy President, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin has thrown a bomb to shatter the facade of UMNO and Cabinet unity which the Prime Minister’s Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s PMO Communications Unit had carefully crafted with a six-paragraph statement after the Cabinet meeting on Wednesday on the RM42 billion 1MBD scandal.

Muhyiddin’s seven-paragraph statement late last evening has smashed Najib’s six-para PMO Statement on the Cabinet position on the RM42 billion 1MDB scandal into smithereens.

The UMNO Divisional chiefs meeting was supposed to be a “show of force” by the pro-Najib forces in UMNO to demonstrate how unshakeable and even invincible was Najib’s position in UMNO despite all the talk, inside and outside the country, of a gathering of anti-Najib forces coming to a crescendo with the many crisis of confidence and financial scandals coming to a head – whether the five-year jailing of Anwar Ibrahim; the Altantuya Shaariibuu murder case with Azila and Sirul convicted and sentenced to death for the murder but the whole country asking who had ordered the two former police commandos to kill and use Defence Ministry explosives to blow up her body; the blacklisting and second by-passing of Justice Hishammudin from elevation to Federal Court for being the most respected serving judge of integrity; the cacophony of extremist, intolerant and bigoted hate speech, both on race and religion; or what the DAP MP for Petaling Jaya Utara Tony Pua has described as “the mother of mother of mother of financial scandals”, the RM42 billion 1MDP scandal!

Not that Najib does not have chinks in his armour or Achilles Heel but the pro-Najib forces were supremely confident that the UMNO Divisional Chiefs meeting tomorrow could be transformed into a triumphant Najib gathering akin to crowning him as the undisputed UMNO President.

But all this has crumbled with Muhyiddin’s seven-para statement which disputed Najib’s six-para PMO statement, in fact questioning the claim that the Cabinet had issued the 1MDB with a clean bill of health and integrity.

Otherwise, why is Muhyiddin asking for experts to assist the Auditor-General in conducting the audit in the shortest time possible for a complete and comprehensive report about 1MDB’s finances, including to verify 1MDB’s accounts from 2009, adding that a forensic audit must be done to ensure there was no financial irregularities in 1MDB’s transactions; that there should not be any bailout of 1MDB if it involves public funds, and that the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) should carry out an independent probe without having to wait for the Auditor-General.

Is the PAC, particular its Chairman, Datuk Nur Jazlan going to listen to Najib or Muhyiddin?

What is clear is that the 1MDB scandal is no more an “untouchable subject” at the UMNO Divisional Chairmen’s meeting tomorrow, which had been the object of the six-para PMO Statement on the Cabinet meeting on Wednesday – banning the subject from Parliament and all UMNO/Bnl meetings until the outcome of the Auditor-General’s investigations which can take years.

Will any UMNO Division chairman “bell the cat” tomorrow?

(Media Statment in Kota Kinabalu on Saturday, March 7, 2015)