The Minister for Communications and Multimedia, Datuk Salleh Said Keruak was mystified by the Pakatan Harapan leadership council decision yesterday on the structure of Pakatan Harapan and asked about the absence of the DAP leaders in the top three positions in the Pakatan Harapan line-up.

He asked: “Was DAP sidelined or the line-up was deliberately done to make as if the coalition is dominated by the Malays?”

It is neither.

DAP is neither sidelined nor do we dominate Pakatan Harapan, which is coalition of political equals based on the operational principle of consensus, unlike Barisan Nasional which is founded on UMNO hegemony.

For quite some time, the main thrust of UMNO/BN propaganda of UMNO leaders, propagandists and cybertroopers was to purvey the lies, fake news and false information that DAP dominated Pakatan Harapan and that I am a “dictator of dictators”, exercising dictatorship not only in DAP but also in Pakatan Harapan; and that Malay leaders like Mohamad Sabu, Azmin Ali, Rafizi Ramli, Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, Tan Sri Muhyiddin and Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad have sold their soul and were just my stooges and puppets.

This serves the UMNO grand strategy of a propaganda campaign of lies, fake news and false information to poison the Malay ground with the fear that if UMNO is defeated in the next general election, the Malays will suffer as the Chinese will grab the political power from the Malays.

These are all lies – for Malaysia can only start anew and find greatness if UMNO is defeated; and if UMNO is defeated, the Chinese will not grab the political power of the Malays as Malay political power in Malaysia is assured, with the Prime Minister from Pakatan Harapan a Malay and not a Chinese or non-Malay.

The trouble with UMNO leaders, propagandists and cybertroopers is that they come to believe and live in the world of their own propaganda and lies, but they have to wake up one day to face the political realities.

One of these political realities in Malaysia is the that the time for UMNO is up and national salvation lies in a new political coalition in Putrajaya.

This is why July 13 will go down as one of the most important dates in Malaysian political history, for the new structure, political leadership and direction decided by the Pakatan Harapan Presidential Council last night heralded a re-ignition of new hope and confidence among Malaysians that there can be political change in Putrajaya in the next general election.

Salleh said that the opposition coalition can never match BN, which has a “track record of co-operation between different ethnic groups and tolerance between its leaders, without compromising party principles”.

I agree with Salleh that Pakatan Harapan can never match UMNO/Barisan Nasional coalition in making Malaysia overnight into a “global kleptocracy”, and we defintely do not want to match UMNO/BN on corruption and abuses of power.

We want to save Malaysia from the international infamy and ignominy of a “global kleptocracy” and ensure that Malaysia fulfils our early promise to become a vibrant democracy and a model to the world as an united, harmonious, just, progressive and prosperous nation where the diversities of race, religion, language and culture are national assets and strengths and not national liabilities and weaknesses.

What Salleh and the UMNO/BN leaders, propagandists and cybertroopers must understand is that Pakatan Harapan is a different coalition altogether from the UMNO/BN coalition, where UMNO hegemony is accepted as a modus operandi by all the other 13 component parties, who are left with an increasingly subservient and servile role.

Pakatan Harapan, on the other hand, is a coalition of equals, where no party exercises hegemony like UMNO in BN, and where consensus from all the four component parties is the basic operational principle of the coalition.

There is no consensus in Barisan Nasional – only UMNO hegemony, which is best illustrated by the total silence and subservience of the other BN parties to the 1MDB scandal, where there is not a single Minister (even from Sarawak) who dare to ask in Cabinet who is “MO1” and who is “wife of MO1” with the RM117 million pink diamond necklace presented by 1MDB mastermind, Jho Low, from stolen 1MDB funds!

(Media Conference Statement in Miri on Friday, 14th July 2017 at 4 pm)