RPK:Finally,it's a matter of perception

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER
Raja Petra Kamarudin

This was the problem we faced in the past. We could never get Anwar Ibrahim’s legal and political advisors to agree on a common strategy.

And Anwar had more than one advisor. And each advisor had his/her own idea of what the best strategy was. This was why we considered the Sodomy 1 legal/political defence badly handled.

Some of these advisors lamented about the frustration they faced in getting Anwar to agree to a strategy and to stick to the agreed strategy. Sometimes the legal team embarked on a political campaign rather than a legal campaign. And sometimes the political team appeared to be launching a legal campaign rather than a political campaign.

This was probably the best example of too many cooks spoiling the broth. And an added frustration was: after getting Anwar to agree to a certain strategy, someone else would go meet Anwar and he would agree to another course of action. It appeared like ‘the last one in’ had the final say and the earlier agreed course of action would be abandoned in favour of the latest idea.

Any general would tell you that you do not change course in midstream. Once the direction has been decided you stick to it and see it to the end. Once the forces have advanced and you change course, this would mean utter chaos with everyone not only going in opposite directions but also at times bumping into each other.

This is a sure way of losing the battle and finding your forces trapped in the open. As they say, there are no bad soldiers, only bad commanders. And a bad commander is one who sends his/her forces all over the place with no clear direction from the top.

I used to be one of those who faced this frustration. Just as I thought everything had been agreed and a concrete battle plan had been formulated, I receive word that someone has managed to convince Anwar to agree to a new strategy and what had been earlier agreed was now no longer on.

There was many an occasion when I just gave up. When I inquired into whom this new ‘mastermind’ was, I was appalled to hear that the change of direction was mooted by the very person who was the architect of an earlier most disastrous campaign.Read more.