“Each wrong idea we follow is a crime committed against future generations.”

- Arthur Koestler, Darkness at Noon

COMMENT | Whenever Pakatan Harapan gets flak for its backpedalling, the response from its political operatives and propagandists is to plead for more time.

This is a rather juvenile response from 'New Malaysia' politicians, because time is limited in a democracy, with fortunes and consequences changing – sometimes overnight – in politics.

The reality is that Harapan has five years until the next elections to demonstrate that they can manipulate the system to their advantage and leverage that for another term. This is the realpolitik of it.

Asking for more time is "the dog ate my homework" of excuses, especially since before the election, Harapan positioned itself as the magic bullet that could “save Malaysia.”

Recent public statements from the Harapan elite that the reason why they cannot fulfil certain promises is because it costs money as the former government left them with debt is a lie. There are systemic changes they can make which would cost them very little, but it would not be politically expedient to do so.

Harapan and its partners should cease attempting to gaslight its base and wallow in propagandists' responses to criticisms. The most recent example is the DAP response to my column questioning the party's attempts to find a “middle ground...