In final leg, Harapan's offensive unsettles BN but many voters still undecided

TJ PIAI POLLS | Pakatan Harapan is going full throttle in the final lap of the Tanjung Piai by-election in Johor in an attempt to reclaim lost ground.

Despite this, many voters Malaysiakini spoke to still appear to be on the fence.

However, the offensive has left BN, and MCA in particular, worried. Party operatives indicated that they are less optimistic about their chances compared to a week ago.

Going into the by-election, BN - which lost the parliamentary seat in the 2018 general election by a slim 524-vote majority - was seen as having an edge over Harapan due to voters' disgruntlement with the coalition.

The former ruling coalition looked set to retain its Malay support base on top of benefitting from PAS' endorsement while some Chinese voters indicated their intent to cast protest votes against Harapan.

Faced with declining support, Harapan had pumped almost RM17 million into Tanjung Piai, most of it before nomination day.

On the campaign front, it has been a slow start for Harapan. MCA, which in the past struggled to attract a handful of people to its ceramah, sometimes outdid the ruling coalition in crowd size.

But Harapan's campaign began to gain momentum in the final week with the arrival of top guns such as PKR president Anwar Ibrahim and Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

At his two ceramah on Monday, Anwar drew a crowd of over 400 in Pekan Nanas and over 700 at the main stage in Pontian town.

The build-up continued on Wednesday when some 2,500 showed up to hear Mahathir speak in Kukup.

Harapan ramps up offensive

Harapan pulled out all the stops, sometimes even dipping a finger into racial campaigning, something which it had criticised BN for in the past.

This included fliers urging voters at the ceramah attended by Mahathir to "vote Muslims first" which Harapan leaders promptly dismissed as an act of sabotage after it was publicised, despite the colour, margin and format of the fliers matching other Harapan campaign material at the event.

Mahathir also wrote a personal appeal letter urging Tanjung Piai voters to support Harapan's Karmaine Sardini over BN's Wee Jeck Seng.

Both Mahathir and Anwar's messages were similar – It is too early to judge and punish Harapan.

Apart from trying to arrest protest votes, Harapan also trained its guns on Jeck Seng with billboards declaring that a vote for him is a vote for former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak, who is standing trial for allegedly misappropriating billions of ringgit from 1MDB.

DAP also dredged up Jeck Seng's performance as the former Labuan Port Authority chairperson, including spending RM343,000 in renovation works on a vacant office that included a smart toilet.

Meanwhile, a video from last year of Umno Youth exco member Wan Muhammad Azri Wan Deris, better known as Papagomo, saying Chinese and Indians should have their voting rights fofeited, is also being played up again. The clip is circulated with pictures of Papagomo with MCA leaders.

The strategy appeared to be effective, forcing the initially buoyant MCA on the defensive with Jeck Seng refusing to comment on the allegations while his boss, MCA president Wee Ka Siong, stepped up to shield him.

A Facebook gaffe by Jeck Seng about "opposing Jawi" which he later edited, also did not help.

Najib, who was on the stump for Jeck Seng at a BN-PAS ceramah last night, dismissed it as "spin" despite many who Malaysiakini spoke to in the crowd appearing clueless about the Facebook post.

However, it reflected BN's concern about the possible erosion of its Malay support base.

Top guns build momentum

At Mahathir's predominantly Malay ceramah on Wednesday, many of those who attended turned up in Harapan colours, suggesting that they are party workers who might not necessarily be voters but the crowd size appeared to have a psychological effect on the locals.

"A lot of people went to see (them speak) because right now the one in charge is the government. If we choose the opposition who do we complain to?" said retired fisherman Hasan Abdul Aziz who hails from the Serkat polling district.

Echoing this was a civil servant who wanted to be identified only as Rahim.

"If there is a swing in support, it is because of people like Mahathir coming to town. I was at the Kukup ceramah and there were so many people," he said.

A local restaurant owner, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he did not want partisanship to affect his business, said he believed Harapan had made inroads in his predominantly Malay area even though BN still commanded the majority of support there.

However, disgruntlement still persisted amongst some voters. For example, Rahim said his mother wanted to support BN after the government scaled back on aid.

"She was a BN supporter. After the general election, she thought Harapan might be good but then she changed her mind because she did not get government aid," he said.

This disgruntlement is more pronounced in the Chinese community over several government missteps, such as the introduction of Jawi lessons in vernacular schools and Mahathir's presence at the Malay Dignity Congress last month where some participants made inflammatory speeches.

Mahathir and Anwar's appeals not to cast protest votes have not entirely convinced them.

Undecided voters still unconvinced

Met at a DAP ceramah in Pekan Nanas town last night, Grace Tong said she is considering voting for BN due to the government's performance falling below expectations and Mahathir's alleged pandering to racial sentiments.

"I admit, last year I followed the trend (of supporting Harapan), but this time I need to make a more careful choice, so I'm listening to both Harapan and MCA ceramah to compare for myself

"Mahathir is very anti-Chinese, a lot of policies he proposed are geared towards a singular direction and is not inclusive," she said.

Tong, who works as a salesperson, also lamented the state of the economy, saying the market in Tanjung Piai was inactive.

Meanwhile, youths Siaw Jun Jie and Tan Wei Hao said they have yet to make up their mind on who to vote for.

"For this by-election, we are still considering whether to vote for the candidate or vote for the party, some of our friends have the same thoughts," Siaw said.

 The duo said that if they were to choose a candidate, it would be Jeck Seng, whom , according to them, served Tanjung Piai well despite not being an active MP in the Dewan Rakyat.

"The reason we are still undecided is because the party (BN) behind Jeck Seng is bad, but we are also not sure whether the Harapan candidate (Karmaine Sardini) is good even though the party is okay," Tan added.

The two had previously split their votes at the state and parliamentary levels.

(subhead) BN less optimistic despite persistent anger at Harapan

On the defensive, there is now concern within MCA that it would not benefit as much as it hoped for from the protest votes as some Chinese voters might choose Gerakan instead.

Yesterday, MCA secretary-general Chong Sin Woon complained that Gerakan had only been targeting MCA and accused the party of splitting the Chinese votes.

“I think Gerakan is more like a hitman who is attacking MCA from the side and not out to win this by-election. When they have no opinions towards their other opponents, it is suspicious,” he said.

MCA's flailing responses in the final week of campaign have sometimes bordered on panic.

The attack on Gerakan is noteworthy as neither BN nor Harapan had paid attention to the party in the early stages.

Gerakan's Wendy Subramaniam does not have a realistic chance of winning the by-election but can play spoiler that could tilt a closely-contested by-election in either direction.

The stakes appear to have increased in the final hours of campaigning as both BN and Harapan seek to step up their game.

The contest for Tanjung Piai is expected to go down to the wire with two research institutes giving conflicting predictions on the outcome.

With many still on the fence at the eleventh hour, the battle for the hearts and minds of Tanjung Piai voters might continue until the moment they step into the voting booth.

Apart from Jeck, Karmaine and Wendy, other contenders in the by-election are Berjasa's Badhrulhisham Abdul Aziz and independent candidates Ang Chuan Lock and Faridah Aryani Abd Ghaffar.

Campaigning began on Nov 2 and Tanjung Piai voters would go to the polls tomorrow.

The by-election was called after the incumbent MP, Bersatu's Md Farid Md Rafik, died from a heart attack in September, just three weeks before his 43rd birthday. - Mkini