PAS research centre PPP believes the opposition pact Pakatan Harapan will not last as long as its relatively short-lived Pakatan Rakyat.

Its director Zuhdi Marzuki said this based on new squabbles among Pakatan Harapan’s members, PKR, DAP and the PAS splinter party, Parti Amanah Rakyat.

“Based on the conflicts between Pakatan Harapan component parties and the parties’ own internal issues, it is projected that Pakatan Harapan may only last until the just after the 14th general election.

“In fact, PPP does not discount the high likelihood that the coalition will break up before the election, given the stream of conflicts,” Zuhdi said in a scathing statement.

The statement by Zuhdi ( photo ) statement comes as DAP secretary-general and Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng rails against PKR after five if its assemblypersons abstained from voting on a motion by an Umno assemblyperson calling for transparency in land reclamation projects in Penang.

PKR deputy president and Selangor Menteri Besar Azmin Ali also told Amanah partners to stop criticising the Selangor state government, which still consists representatives from PAS.

Zuhdi also projects that Pakatan Harapan will be unable to replicate Pakatan Rakyat’s performance in the last general election because it will not be able to attract Malay voters.

He also claimed that Pakatan Harapan will fail to attract Indian voters because “there are no top leaders from the Indian community in Pakatan Harapan today”.

There will also be problems in the division of seats for contest, he said.

In the 13th general election, Pakatan Rakyat brokered straight fights with BN in all seats but two where PAS and PKR went against each other in three-cornered fights.

Conflicting stands on TPPA

Zuhdi said Pakatan Harapan’s stand on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), or lack thereof, showed that the member the parties could not see eye-to-eye.

He claimed that DAP is more likely to back the TPPA, PKR would stay silent while only several Amanah leaders have spoken against the agreement, which would be put to vote in Parliament.

This contrasts with PAS, which has consistently opposed the agreement, he added.

Lim had earlier said that DAP needs to study the agreement, but that it would not back the TPPA in Parliament if it means prices of medicines would go up.

At an event in Kuala Lumpur last week, United States President Barack Obama claimed that the TPPA would not harm access to low-priced generic medicines.

However, the MP for Klang, Charles Santiago of DAP and PKR’s Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah Anwar argued that provisions for intellectual property rights for drug-makers could mean pricier medicines.

According to previously leaked drafts of the TPPA text, US negotiators had been pushing for a 12-year data exclusivity period for a new class of biologics, which would be in line with current laws in the US.

The final text stipulates at least an eight-year protection, or in the alternative, a five-year protection coupled with other measures that would deliver equivalent results. The Malaysian government has indicated that it is going for the latter option.