By Baradan Kuppusamy, The Star
It was an exhilarating year for opposition leader and PKR adviser Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim who emerged from the political wilderness to come within a whisker of overthrowing his tormentor Umno and capturing state power.
As in 1998 when he was one step away from becoming Prime Minister but ended up sacked and jailed, he is again one step away as the effective power behind the Pakatan Rakyat coalition and as opposition leader controlling 82 seats in parliament.
Yet the final step eluded him despite a massive build-up to Sept 16, the date that Anwar claimed BN backbenchers would defect to his side to topple the government and finally enable him to become Prime Minister.
Becoming Prime Minister has been his goal ever since he gave up a sterling career as a neutral, firebrand Islamist leader in 1982 for a meteoric career as an Umno leader.
He was the man that then Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad picked to implement “Islam in-government” and he did a massively successfully job.
By 1996 he was in a strong enough position to challenge Dr Mahathir and saw in the Asian financial crisis of 1997 the opportunity to unseat his boss. But all that is history.
Today his once-feared fundamentalist Islamist leanings don’t cause a ripple among non-Muslims; instead he heads a growing multi-racial party that is the undisputed dominant component in the Pakatan Rakyat coalition.
Anwar has successfully reinvented himself as a “new age” leader espousing multi-culturalism, racial equality and affirmative action for all Malaysians who need it, not just bumiputras.
The Sept 16 gambit has dented his credibility and politically set him back but if ever there is an incorrigible optimist, it must be Anwar.
His new target is to capture Sarawak and with its 31 MPs march into Putrajaya.
If that fails, he will simply come up with another scheme.
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