Utusan calls for Umno to decide on sacking Saifuddin

Umno should make up its mind to sack Datuk Saifuddin Abdullah, said party mouthpiece Utusan Malaysia, following the former deputy minister's actions in attending an opposition event recently. Although columnist Awang Selamat, a pseudonym for its collective editorial team, did not clearly state his call to sack Saifuddin, nevertheless he felt that the Umno top leadership should not sit on the matter since both parties were no longer compatible. "To Awang, Saifuddin is no longer interested in Umno and Umno also is no longer dependent on him. "Moreover, his influence within the party has waned after his lost in Temerloh," he wrote, referring to Saifuddin's former parliamentary seat, which he lost to PAS during the 2013 general election. "So what is there to wait... there is no compatibility anymore between the two," Awang wrote in his column published in the Malay daily's weekend edition, Mingguan Malaysia. Saifuddin's attendance at the September 22 roundtable discussion on the new opposition pact Pakatan Harapan led to calls for his sacking from Umno, with party secretary-general Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor saying he had "tarnished" the image of the ruling Malay party. But Saifuddin had told The Star he was there to "achieve the higher objective of politics”. "I believe in talking to every side," he was quoted as saying. He said he had been at the meeting in his capacity as chairman of another non-governmental organisation, Akademi Belia. He is also CEO of the Global Movement of Moderates. Saifuddin was subsequently issued a show-cause letter from his party. He replied yesterday asking for clarification on what exactly he did wrong. – October 4, 2015.