Putra Jaya: The people and members of the Barisan Nasional (BN) can decide whether the time is right to turn BN into a single party with a new name in line with the current political changes, said BN Secretary-General Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor.He said the proposal, which was made before the 13th General Election (GE13), had been revived and should be given serious attention so that BN remained relevant especially to youths.
"We (BN) are indeed looking at the issue of whether the time is ripe for BN to morph into a single party. Whether the people are ready or not, we don't know. But many are saying it must be done. We are looking at and scrutinising the methods to implement the proposal.
"We (BN) also received a lot of feedback from component parties which agree to only have one party. We also have to change BN's name, for example, to Barisan Satu Rakyat," he said after witnessing a Muai Thai performance organised in conjunction with the 2013 Putrajaya Youth Festival, here, Saturday.
Tengku Adnan, who is also Federal Territories Minister, said prior to this, several BN component parties had expressed their agreement on turning BN into a single party to make it more effective in approaching and serving the people.
Recently, Gerakan Acting President, Datuk Chang Ko Youn, suggested that BN be turned into a single party after the BN only won 133 of the Parliamentary seats in GE13 on May 5 compared to 140 seats in GE12.
Meanwhile, in Bagan Datoh, Umno Vice-President Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said the suggestion by Gerakan that Barisan Nasional (BN) turns into a single party must be studied very carefully before its implementation.
He said this was because the suggestion could have been made in a 'desperate' situation with the Chinese community regarding the Gerakan party as no longer relevant and merely wanted to depend on the BN.
"I don't think that the Umno leadership will agree to the formation of a single party as suggested by the Gerakan party leader," he said.
Ahmad Zahid, who is also the Home Minister, said what was more important for the Gerakan party now was to strengthen the party and restructure its organisation.
