Malaysia's Islamists eye mainstream ally

KOTA BARU, Malaysia, June 1 (Reuters) Malaysia's Islamist party said today it would work with closely with de-facto opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim to challenge the ruling coalition's 50-year grip on power.

Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS) chief Hadi Awang said his party, which wants Malaysia to be an Islamic state based on sharia law, had agreed several broad policy strategies with Anwar's Parti Keadilan Rakyat.

''The Barisan government continues to tolerate manipulation, malpractices and abuse of power,'' the cleric told party faithful at a three-day annual meeting in Malaysia's northeastern state of Kelantan, his party's lone bastion.

''We will eradicate these ills once we are given the mandate to rule,'' he told about 3,000 party members, many of them wearing white skull caps. In line with strict Islamic practice, men and women in his audience sat apart.

PAS was an opposition force until it was crushed in 2004 elections and is seeking a way out of the political wilderness.

The Islamist party advocates punishments such as stoning and amputation, an ambition Hadi restated today, saying, ''The goal of Islam and its entire laws should be upheld''.

In Kelantan, the party has enacted Islamic hudud law, which punishes rapists and adulterers with stoning to death, while thieves face having limbs cut off, but PAS is constitutionally barred from enforcing it.

Since regaining power in Kelantan in 1990, it has ordered Muslim women to cover their heads and banned betting, nightclubs and public consumption of alcohol.

With Keadilan in turmoil after a leadership tussle that sparked several resignations last week, Anwar did not attend Friday's PAS meeting, though he is due to speak at a public rally in Kota Baru late tomorrow.

Anwar is unable to stand for office until April 2008, barred by his criminal record after being jailed in 1999 on charges of corruption and sodomy that he has always said were trumped up, and currently has the role of adviser to Keadilan.

An election is not due until 2009, but Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi is widely expected to call a snap poll by early 2008 to capitalise on opposition disunity and the buoyant economy.

The opposition, for its part, would seek to capitalise on growing discontent with Abdullah's Barisan Nasional coalition over rising living costs and poor governance, Hadi said. Hadi said PAS would introduce minimum wages and a welfare system providing free education, medical and other services if elected.

REUTERS SW VV1915