According to PAS’s mouthpiece Harakah Daily, the party’s Syura Council secretary, Nik Muhammad Zawawi Salleh, said Ahmad Yakob, the current deputy spiritual adviser, was retained in his position due to his busy work schedule as Kelantan’s Menteri Besar.
“We picked and appointed Tuan Guru Haji Hashim Jasin because he’s the oldest in the Syura Council.
“Besides that, he is very knowledgeable and has mature political foresight,” he said, adding that Ahmad himself had proposed Hashim for the position.
Haron, 76, the previous spiritual leader, died last month from heart complications at the Stanford University Hospital in San Francisco.
Spiritual leaders play the role of adviser to the party’s executive and are the point of reference in its struggles. They, however, are not involved in the executive management of the party.