KUALA LUMPUR - PRIME Minister Najib Razak will launch a new Indian party next month as he seeks new Indian allies to win back support from the community.
'The Prime Minister has been invited, and will be attending the launch,' his senior press secretary, Datuk Tengku Shariffudin Ahmad, confirmed on Thursday.
The Makkal Sakti party was formed by one faction of the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf), which shot to prominence two years ago after it led thousands of Indians to protest against their plight. Hindraf splintered into factions after its leaders were jailed. They have since been released.
Datuk Seri Najib's attendance at the Makkal Sakti launch will be seen as a snub to the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) - a founding partner of the Barisan Nasional (BN) - which has been led by Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu for 30 years.
Mr Samy Vellu has been seen as a liability after he lost his long-time Sungai Siput parliamentary seat in Perak in last year's general election. However, he has refused to step down from his MIC post. He kept his president's post unchallenged, while his allies were elected into key posts in a recent party election.
'Unless the MIC does some soul-searching, and for as long as the president is not accepted by the community, the Prime Minister has to look for alternatives,' said Professor Sivamurugan Pandian, a political analyst.
Mr Najib had already made this clear. When he visited the Batu Caves temple during Thaipusam, he did so without Mr Samy Vellu's presence.
When some Malays stepped on a cow's head last month to protest against the building of a Hindu temple in their neighbourhood, Mr Najib had conveyed his message to the community through Human Resource Minister S. Subramaniam.
But while Mr Najib has made a new ally in the Makkal Sakti party, there is no move yet to bring it into the BN. Makkal Sakti is led by former Hindraf national coordinator R. S. Thanenthiran, 47, who insisted that the party will remain independent.
'We are working together with him as partner,' he was quoted as saying by a website. 'It is true the BN did not do much for us in the past 52 years, but the Pakatan Rakyat has done even less for us in the past two years.'
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