Federal opposition parties PKR, DAP, and Parti Amanah Negara have formed a new political coalition from the ashes of the Pakatan Rakyat, which they have christened the Pakatan Harapan.
The new coalition was announced after a roundtable discussion between the three parties today in Subang Jaya.
PKR president Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail said the new coalition shares a common platform of proposing jailed former parliamentary opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim as its candidate for Prime Minister should Pakatan Harapan defeats the ruling Barisan Nasional in the next general elections.
“This is for the people. Parties who attend the roundtable session agreed to form an opposition coalition called Pakatan Harapan,” she said, as quoted by The Malay Mail Online‘s Shazwan Mustafa Kamal.
The new coalition also held out hope that former Pakatan Rakyat partner PAS would join its ranks, despite the palpable disagreements that still exist between the popular Islamist party and Pakatan Harapan’s component parties.
PAS and DAP are still mired in deep mistrust over their disagreement on PAS’s push for Islamic hudud criminal punishments, and Parti Amanah Rakyat is comprised mainly of former “progressive” PAS leaders who left the party after the last party elections, which saw their positions being taken over by more conservative ulama class politicians.
