The role of the Pakatan Harapan presidential council must be strengthened to ensure that the ruling coalition is right on track, says PKR lawmaker Hassan Abdul Karim.

"In my opinion, to ensure that the Harapan coalition is on track, the role of the presidential council must be strengthened so that it's the council that leads the government, not otherwise," he said.

However, the Pasir Gudang MP did not elaborate on how the council should be strengthened.

His statement came in light of Pakatan Harapan's crushing defeat in the recent Tanjung Piai by-election.

Commenting on the defeat, Hassan hoped that the Harapan presidential council would go back to its election manifesto, which he said contained "the winning recipe" to win the next general election.

"I'm a positive person. I believe Harapan can rise again. The recipe to retain the victory in the next general election is still there and solid.

"The winning recipe is in the manifesto. The people commended it. NGOs supported it. The book is still a point of reference.

"The people believe the promises featured in the book."

'Harapan still ahead of the opposition'

Hence, it was no surprise the reason behind the continuous defeat in by-elections is due to the government failing to fulfil the promises, Hassan said, and he urged the presidential council to expedite the post-mortem on the Tanjung Piai by-election.

However, he said, based on the statistics, Harapan was still ahead of the opposition as it had won five out of nine by-elections.

"It's just that it's worrying, as Harapan now has four losses in a row," he said.

In the recent Tanjung Piai by-election, BN, represented by MCA's Wee Jeck Seng, won by a whopping 15,086-vote majority against Harapan's Karmaine Sardini, who is from Bersatu.

Wee garnered 25,466 votes to Karmaine's 10,380 votes.

The turnout was 74.5 percent.