PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang was the first Member of Parliament (MP) to sign the statutory declaration (SD) in support of Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to become the 8th Prime Minister.

This was revealed by Muhyiddin himself in his speech at the Perikatan Nasional (PN) Administration’s Half-Year Convention here, today.

The Prime Minister said it was Abdul Hadi’s move that prompted other PN-aligned MPs to do the same during their individual meeting with the Yang di-Pertuan Agong Al-Sultan Abdullah Ri’ayatuddin Al-Mustafa Billah Shah at Istana Negara last February.

“They were invited by Al-Sultan Abdullah to the palace to sign the SD and I want to inform you that the first SD was Haji (Abdul) Hadi’s.

“He was the first to put my name on the SD paper,” he said.

Last February, His Majesty had consented to conduct a one-to-one interview of all 222 MPs to identify one of them who has the majority support to be appointed as the prime minister.

“Personally, I didn’t expect to become the Prime Minister. There was no complot, no extraordinary political scheme to take over or topple someone, but it happened following a political crisis that was quite critical at that time, which we all knew,” he said.

Meanwhile, Muhyiddin said for a government without a specific manifesto, it was hard for the people to evaluate the performance of the PN government.

“However, this does not mean I can do things as I like. No manifesto does not mean I don’t have a responsibility or accountability to the people. I still have to demonstrate accountability as a leader,” he said.

The prime minister said PN government was not formed as a result of a general election but was based on provisions in the Federal Constitution.

Therefore, the PN government does not have any manifesto or promises which are usually presented to the people during election campaigns, he added.

-- BERNAMA