Following phone controversy, UMNO members said it’s about time for Zahid to step down.

Two experts, Kartini Aboo Talib Khalid from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) and Prof Dr Azmi Hassan from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) had the same view regarding internal conflicts arising within UMNO and PKR following the audio recording controversy between their leaders which points to Zahid and Anwar having political conspiracy. Both Kartini and Azmi suggested that they should leave the matters of Malaysian politics into the hands of the younger leaders who are able to revive it.

Kartini said that the party’s grassroots are pressuring UMNO leader, Zahid to step down from his position because he has failed to restore the party in its previous position of glory even after having set out a number of political efforts to do so.

She added that these UMNO grassroots view Zahid to be someone who has caused the party enough trouble ever since he has taken over previous president Datuk Seri Najib Razak. One of them was the alleged secret meeting with Anwar and then came the audio recording issue, both which indicates a possibility of UMNO-PKR alliance but more so than anything else, there’s Zahid’s money laundering and corruption charges which brings the entire UMNO party into bad light.

These concerns will make any member think the reason is sufficient enough for Zahid to give it a rest. It was even quoted from an article that UMNO’s Simpang Renggam deputy division chief Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi said that there’s a number of party leaders who suppose that UMNO is bound to fail in the GE15 if Zahid will continue to be the president of the party.

Many of the party’s leaders have expressed their discomfort regarding the conversation caught on an audio recording between Zahid and Anwar and is appealing for the president to resign and let Mohamad Hasan take over especially now that Zahid’s reputation keeps going down and can no longer be fixed. Kartini said that it is the same with Anwar. She’s urging the leader to leave the position to the younger members while acting as an adviser to the PKR party instead since PKR is filled with leaders who have a lot of potential and can compete in the party’s high ranking positions. Kartini commented that it is time for the party members to release Anwar.