Ruling coalition in Malaysia probes rumor of defectors

Malaysia's ruling coalition is investigating claims that the opposition could seize power with the help of lawmakers who are considering defecting, reports said yesterday.

The dominant United Malays National Organization (UMNO) said it was sending teams out to check on rumored defections by members of coalition component parties who were alienated after disastrous March 8 election results.

"Some people are saying this... we will get our intelligence to check," UMNO secretary-general Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor said, according to the New Straits Times.

"Why should they buy our people over when we've already won?" he asked.

"They think we are weak because we lost in five states and we didn't get a two-thirds majority [in parliament]," he said.

SWITCHING SIDES

Emboldened by the results, the worst in the Barisan Nasional coalition's half century of rule over Malaysia, opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim has said that lawmakers have approached him about switching sides.

"I don't know how soon we can form the new government but we are moving in that direction," Anwar, a former Malaysian deputy prime minister who was forced to step down and jailed a decade ago, said earlier this week.

Anwar said that coalition lawmakers from Malaysia's eastern states of Sabah and Sarawak on Borneo island had been in contact with him to discuss switching sides.

The power bloc there has enough members to unseat the government if it were to change hands.

He has insisted that defectors would not be "bought" and other opposition figures have challenged the government to file a police report if they find any evidence of improper payments being made.

DENIAL

Amid reports that the first of the defectors had resigned from the coalition, the Sarawak United People's Party told state media that the stories were not true and insisted that its lawmaker Richard Riot was still a member of the party.

Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has dismissed Anwar's plans and downplayed any suggestions of splits within UMNO, despite a series of high-level resignations that shook up the party.

The prime minister's decision to streamline the cabinet and drop a number of veteran politicians in a new line-up announced on Monday has also alienated government lawmakers who were overlooked.

Barisan Nasional will have 140 lawmakers in the newly arranged 222-seat parliament, compared with 199 in the outgoing 219-seat parliament.

The opposition alliance won 80 seats compared with its previous number of 19.