MALAYSIAN OPPOSITION UNDER THE COSH AS ANWAR FIGHT SEX SCANDAL?

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — The prognosis for Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s political career appear grim after the emergence yesterday of a video which allegedly shows him having sex with an unidentified woman.
Political analysts say it will also complicate People Coalition political party (PR) in Sarawak state general election's campaign and its efforts to arrest a slide in popularity.

• They said that while the allegations remain unproven and the video’s source murky, the all but certain eventual leak of the recording onto the Internet will likely dent Anwar's image. It will also put into focus the opposition pact’s lack of a credible prime ministerial candidate.
• According to independent analyst Ibrahim Suffian, this issue could degrade Pakatan’s focus, if the leadership is not focused, it will affect the effectiveness of the coalition’s preparation for the upcoming state elections, instead of prepping on campaign issues, they will be made to address issues relating to his personal affairs.
• The Merdeka Center director said that the battle for public perception over Anwar’s image as a leader depended on whether or not the sex video was made available to the public. But he cautioned that Anwar was in a lose-lose situation no matter what happened.

Anwar has been repeatedly accused of having affairs culminating in two criminal charges of sodomy in the past 13 years, one of which he is still on trial for.
The opposition leaders were on the defensive yesterday, denying that man in the video was Anwar, almost immediately after the video was screened to selected journalists by a shadowy figure who only identified himself as “Datuk T.”

• “Datuk T” had said that the video was taken from closed-circuit television camera recordings found in a hotel room in Kuala Lumpur.
• Anwar has himself denied that he was the man, and called the emergence of the video recording a “scurrilous attack” against him, his family and opposition coalition; Pakatan Rakyat (PR).
• This has not been the first time the opposition leader has been accused of having affairs, but analysts like Ibrahim say the latest accusation might prove to be the breaking point for the federal opposition.

Anwar was sacked as Deputy Prime Minister in 1998 and charged and convicted of sodomy. He spent six years in prison before the country’s top court overturned the conviction in 2004.
After his release, Anwar led his PKR, DAP and PAS to record gains in Election 2008, denying Barisan Nasional (BN) its traditional two-thirds parliamentary majority and cemented the three parties’ status as serious challengers for power with the formation of the PR pact.

• But he was arrested later the same year and charged again in court on another sodomy accusation involving a former male aide, a charge he has denied.
• So far Anwar has remained defiant in the face of the latest scandal, and despite the bleak outlook his supporters point out that he has made at least one improbable comeback in his career after he was jailed and could still do so.

Source: Malaysian Insider