Barring any last minute withdrawal of either speaker or due to police intervention, tonight's debate on the fuel price hike between PKR supremo Anwar Ibrahim and Umno's information minister Ahmad Shabery Cheek will attract even those who are uninterested in politics. Fuel price hike affected everyone and I am sure everybody is waiting for fuel price reduction the very next day if possible.
Will Anwar thrashed Shabery in a debate between a political old hand and an Umno rising star ? What will be Anwar's answer to the spiralling fuel price? Can Shabery defends the government/Umno policy? This debate is more than the fuel price. It is about political mileage and survival. Anwar is surely taking a high risk in having this debate with an "lowly" ranking Umno official while Umno's confidence on Shabery will be shaken if he can't argue for the government's recent increase of the price of fuel.
Everybody knows about Anwar's background and his mesmerising oratorical skills. Many young Umno leaders in the eighties and nineties were aping his style in public speaking, to the extend of keeping a goatee as Anwar's!
Who is Ahmad Shabery Cheek then? If people thinks that this guy is gonna be "swallowed" by Anwar, they will be in for a surprise. Shabery is not new in putting across his political views and analysis in public platforms. This former UM lecturer has been doing that since the late 80's when he was in his early 30's. He was a popular speaker amongst the undergraduates during that time. He was also a understudy and blue eye boy of veteran Kelantan politician Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and was a former leader of the now defunct Semangat 46 party led by Tengku Razaleigh.
If you have some time to spare tonight, do catch this exciting debate live on TV. Unless of course someone chicken out with whatever reasons or the plug pull off by the ever "hard working" police.
