He said the position of BN and the prime minister would be at risk, if Parliament is dissolved at Umno’s instigation, without the consent of other parties in the government.
Annuar said the current government was a multi-party government and Umno was a minority party. Therefore, Umno should not take the matter lightly, but should hold further discussions with other parties in the government.
“Now this is not like before,” he said, referring to the days before 2018 when Umno was the dominant party and BN held power.
“Right now, Umno is a minority in the government. We are just one party in the government with 41 seats out of 116 seats,” he said, referring to the number of seats in the Dewan Rakyat held by BN and the total number of MPs supporting Ismail Sabri Yaakob’s coalition government.
Ismail’s government has the support of BN (41 seats, of which Umno holds 37), Perikatan Nasional (50), Gabungan Parti Sarawak (18), PBM (2) PBS (1) and independents (4).
Annuar, who is communications and multimedia minister in Ismail’s government, said: “Let’s say Umno wants to dissolve (Parliament) and suddenly other parties in the government say no; if the prime minister says dissolve and other parties do not support him, then the prime minister must resign.
“When he resigns, the current government has the right to nominate the new prime minister and maybe only one party is able to fill the vacancy, because we only have 41. This all needs to be taken into account,” he was quoted as saying by Astro Awani.
Annuar also suggested that Umno conduct a “post-mortem” first before deciding to speed up the 15th general election (GE15).
Umno may have won the Johor and Melaka state elections without having to contend with the strength of PAS there. “However, the situation may be different in states such as Terengganu, Kelantan, Kedah and Perak,” he said, referrring to states considered to be PAS strongholds.
He said while Umno members were not wrong to feel strong after winning in the two states, they should not do something that would only leave them in a trap.
“In my opinion, GE15 should be expedited, but by not trying to make a fuss, unless the intention of making a fuss is to put pressure on the prime minister,” he was quoted as saying.