No need for Syura Council to vet candidates for top 2 posts, says Hashim
PETALING JAYA : PAS spiritual leader Hashim Jasin has dismissed a call for the party's Syura Council to vet candidates for the president and deputy president's posts.
Hashim said that in the current open contest system, those elected typically already have religious backgrounds, reflecting the preferences of PAS members.
'That's why it's not an issue. There's no need for the Syura Council to interfere or set a policy requiring the president and deputy to come strictly from among the ulama or religious scholars,' he told FMT.
Hashim said he was among the earliest to support the call for these top positions to continue being entrusted to individuals with religious backgrounds.
'This matter isn't so crucial that the Syura Council needs to vet the candidates to ensure only religious scholars are selected.
'We leave the process as it is because members do not chase after positions in PAS,' he said, noting that there have been no individual candidate campaigns or factional clashes in the run-up to the party's elections in September.
Earlier, PAS Dewan Ulama committee member Mokhtar Senik proposed that candidates for the party's top two posts be vetted by the Syura Council, PAS's highest decision-making body.
He said this is to ensure that those who intend to challenge the positions currently held by Abdul Hadi Awang and Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man are qualified.
Hadi and Tuan Ibrahim are both members of the Syura Council, which is chaired by Hashim.
Speculation had emerged that, for the first time, the president and deputy president's posts might be contested at the upcoming party elections.
FMT reported that this may happen if Hadi, who has served as president since 2002, steps down, as urged by some members, because of his health.
At the same time, there are rumours that Tuan Ibrahim also intends to make way for new leadership, though there have been calls from the pro-ulama faction for him to defend the party's No 2 post.
On May 22, PAS vice-president Amar Abdullah had called for the party's top leadership posts, especially those of the president and deputy president, to continue to be held by individuals with religious backgrounds to safeguard the party's Islamic foundation.
'I support that view,' Hashim said, stressing that it is important to ensure the party's policies remain rooted in religion.
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