DR. AZMAN SYED AHMAD, Head of International Affairs of the Islamic Party of Malaysia (PAS) and also member of the State Parliament of Malaysia, throws light on the functioning of PAS in Malaysia in an exclusive interview with DR. WAQUAR ANWAR during the latter’s recent visit to Kuala Lumpur. Excerpts:
What is the historical background of PAS?
The Islamic Party of Malaysia has been working in Malaysia since 1951. Then onward we expanded our activities and membership throughout Malaysia. The historical background of the Party is that in 1951 we started as a very small non-governmental organisation. Then it became a fully registered political party.
In 1955 we contested the first Local Council Election. Malaysia was still then under the British rule and they conducted that election. We won quite a number of seats during that British rule. The first general election after the independence of Malaysia in 1957 was held in 1959. PAS participated in that general election and won two villayas (states); the State of Kelantan and the State of Terengganu. We experimented and experienced many ups and downs, thereafter, in our participation in the democratic process in Malaysia.
We used to rule, we used to be in the opposition and we used to have coalition governments. So we ruled holding many ministries in the government and also used to be outside the ruling government. And now PAS is in coalition with two other major opposition parties viz. the Justice Party and the Democratic Action Party, which is a China-based political party in Malaysia. We are the strongest opposition in Malaysia now. We rule four states: the State of Kelantan, the State of Selangor, the State of Penang and the State of Kedah. However, we lost the state of Kedah in the last election.
What is your experience with a democracy?
Historically, we have the experience of democracy for a period longer than any other Islam-based political parties in the world, including some of the Ikhwan movements in the Middle East. We know what is good and what is bad in the context of democracy. Knowing well that the democratic system in Malaysia is not transparent and not at a level playing field, we soldiered on and managed to put a foothold in politics in Malaysia.
Anything special about this experience!
We have around one million full-fledged members throughout the country. We also have, what is known as, the non-Muslim section within the party. For the past five to six years we have been courting non-Muslims especially the Chinese and the Indians. We have Hindus, Christians and Buddhists as PAS members. We call them PAS Supporters Club. They are basically members of the Islamic Party, supporting it and working for its success and together they campaigned in the last election.
Can they share the leadership?
Yes, we have one representative in our central leadership, as a non-Muslim representative. He is a Chinese. At the state levels too, in the Villaya, we have Hindus, Christians who are part of the working committees of our party. They contributed a lot. For the past five years we have basically broken the barrier of the Islamic Party that had been seen for many years as an extreme party, a fundamentalist, and non-tolerant, being propagated by the ruling government. But Alhamdulillah this barrier has been broken in the last general election.
The Chinese felt comfortable with us, they worked and campaigned for us, and they are also part of us in terms of the Supporters Club and membership, sharing their ideas. Alhamdulillah as a result of breaking this barrier both our Dawah and political activities are smoother now. We are striving not only in political area but in Dawah work as well and it is too going very well, Alhamdulillah.
What is the organisational structure of PAS?
In terms of leadership we have the Ulema Council and the Majlis Shoora. We have the CEC, the Central Council Members, headed by the President, Sheikh Abdul Hadi. The Majlis Shoora is headed by our Murshidul Aam, Sheikh Nik Abdul Azeez. We have the Youth Wing, the Muslimah Wing, we also have Nisa Wing, the young Muslimah Wing, thirty years and below comprising mostly the university students. These are apart from our non-Muslim Wing.
Do the Shoora and the CEC comprise two sets of people?
There may be a combination of both the councils. One person may be members of both of them. Some of them are both on the Shoora and the CEC. The CEC is selected by the delegates. Earlier Sheikh Nik Abdul Azeez was both the Murshidul Aam and the President of the Party. He remains our Murshidul Aam while Sheikh Abdul Hadi is our President.
Do you have any constitution translated into English or Arabic language?
No, we have the printed constitution only in the Malay language. However, we are thinking to get it translated into English and Arabic.
How do you train your workers?
Our Manhajul Tarbiah (Training methodology) is based on that of Ikhwanul Muslimeen. All our books and references are based on the writings of the leaders of Al-Ikhwanul Muslimeen and other mo’tabar (worthwhile) ulema of the world. But our Manhajul Tarbiah is based on the situations in Malaysia and not that of the Middle East. We remodelled it to our needs. We focussed on the needs of Malaysia including Malaysians studying oversees in countries like the UK and the USA. This recruitment has been going on for the past 30 years. I am part of such persons recruited oversees. I was recruited while studying in America about 25 years ago. So now we have thousands of professional members because of the recruitment work we did 25 years ago. Such professionals can be located everywhere, in government departments, in NGOs and also in the corporate sector.
In the methodology we have basically normal Usras, normal Tamreens, our normal Muqaiyyams.
Our focus now is on the youth and the young Muslimahs. We have specific units for young Muslimahs, because we know the age difference between Muslimahs who are thirty and above and those who are below twenty and below. We have leadership in almost all villages in every state. And the programme of tarbiah (training) is arranged at all such places.
How do you grant membership?
Membership is open. You can have those who are the most intelligent people, and those who are the poorest people. They can just fill a form, become a member, and we arrange tarbiah for all of them.
Do they become electorate for participating in the elections within the party?
Yes, every member has the right to vote. They vote at the local level elections and their representatives go to the central level. We have thus a two-tier system of voting. However, the right to vote is available to all members. In contrast to what you have in the Jamaat in India we do not have any system of restricted membership. However, in terms of tarbiah we have different levels; that for the members, the youth, the Muslimah, etc.
So a person becomes a member without any previous background of knowledge or commitment and then you begin his or her tarbiah. Does this system work smoothly?
Yes, our network is strong. Almost in every village we have our units. So in every village new entrants will have leaders who ensure that they go through the required tarbiah, especially usrahs. And we also concentrate on building what we call musallah. So in all villages we have musallahs which we refer to as PAS Markaz.
Does Musallah mean mosque?
No, they are not mosques. These Musallahs are our Markaz in that place. So far we have had no problem and things have moved smoothly and developed properly.
Your experiment with non-Muslim membership in unique in this regard and we would love to understand this from you.
Well, it took us quite some time, ya Akhi, our ulema had a long discussion and in the last we had an international meet in London wherein reputed ulema from the whole world, including Yusuf-al-Qaradhavi, and Faisal Molvi participated to discuss this issue of non-Muslim membership. So, Alhamdulillah, the whole leadership of ulema gave us the blessing that this is the high time to go ahead in this regard.
Is there any debate with any section disagreeing with the line?
Earlier it was debatable but once we got the fatwa from ulema including Qaradhavi and others, it did not remain so. After getting the fatwa from the great ulema we straight away went ahead and opened our party to non-Muslims to be part of our political process.
How do you look at other experiments in other places, say Turkey?
We share the experiments of our brothers in Turkey, the Middle East, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt and other places. We use all these experiences before us for devising political process we are doing in our country. For example, we know that our brothers in the Middle East are going through very difficult time. Their trials and tribulations are different from those in Malaysia. Although, we had our leaders being jailed in Malaysia but these are not as bad as in the Middle East. We learnt lessons, so many lessons, and we experiment with these lessons.
Any special lesson you learnt?
Take the case of Turkey. The country is facing the threat of super powers. And international politics is involved in how you deal with the United Nations, the United States and other super powers. It is not that easy. There is difference between theory and practice. We learnt a lot from these situations.
[waquaranwar@yahoo.com]