Thursday, March 04, 2010

Sothinathan back in MIC's good graces

Former party rebel S Sothinathan is back on the MIC political stage and there's speculation that he might soon be made a senator as well as the next senate president.

NONEA MIC source said Sothinathan (left), being a lawyer and former favourite of S Samy Velu, would have an advantage against other challengers within the party for the senator post as well as the top senate post.

At present MIC has six senators consisting of S Chandrasekaran, Dr Malasingam, M Logachitra, Usha Nanthini, Daljit Singh and N Ravichandran.

Senators are given a three-year term of office and another three-year lifeline if the party chief is in favour of extending the term of office.

However, Samy has announced that one term as senator is sufficient for party members and that other potential members should also be given a chance.

There will be two possible MIC senator seats vacant for this year as Ravichandran's term of office has ended in January 2010 and Logachitra's term ends in April this year.

Currying favour with Samy

The senate president's post is normally rotated among the three main BN component parties of Umno, MCA and MIC. The latter is set to fill the senate top post this year.

Many MIC members who do not enjoy a BN political post are now making a rush to be in the good books of Samy and possibly become a senator in the hope of bagging a deputy minister post or even fill up the senate chief's post.

Malaysiakini has learned that Samy has already submitted the list of potential senator candidates to Premier Najib Abdul Razak for his final decision.

A source says Samy believes in Sothinathan's potential as a second-rank leader, just needing a political platform to climb up the MIC hierarchy ladder.

NONESothinathan previously contested for the post of MIC deputy president, losing to G Palanivel (right).

But Sothinathan is expected to face strong challenges from fellow party leaders such as party secretary-general S Murugesan, party information chief P Kamalanathan, and former Ijok state assemblyperson S Parthiban.

Meanwhile the MIC source stated that while Sothinathan is gaining rapport with Samy, Deputy Federal Territories Minister M Saravanan is allegedly drifting away from the MIC president.

The communication gap between the two is widening and it is alleged that Saravanan is not attending party meetings and not seeing eye-to-eye with the MIC president.

Recently Saravanan lost a civil suit filed by his former business partner and he has been told to pay about RM1.9 million to his partner. This turn of events allegedly did not go down well with the party leadership.

courtesy of Malaysiakini

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