TSUNAMI OF THE ‘CINA’ TO BN

For Umno-BN, this win would be the endorsement of the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his government; for PAS, it would have been a show that they can walk alone; and for Amanah, had it won, it would have showed that the new party has ‘arrived’.

Zakiah Koya, The Heat Malaysia

As expected from the start, Barisan Nasional (BN) swept both parliamentary constituencies of Kuala Kangsar and Sungai Besar with a good majority.

What was not expected is the whopper majority that it won in both constituencies, leaving the other candidates far behind, and getting a big swing of the Chinese votes.

It is almost a deja vu of the 2008 general election (GE) results, only this time, the tsunami was on the side of BN.

And just as that GE, it was very much the same scene, (albeit with a smaller turnout than in 2013) but with the players switched sides. Barisan Nasional was not strong but it won because the opposition was disunited and pitted against each other, and the voters decided to teach the opposition a lesson by voting in BN.

For the past two weeks, Malaysians were inundated with the campaigning in Kuala Kangsar and Sungai Besar. Despite the fasting month, the campaigning was in full blast. Money changed hands, billboards torn down, groceries handed out, fights flared, parties accused one another, media played their support to candidates and the party machineries went full steam, for this double by-election were deemed to be the litmus test for the three parties contesting.

For Umno-BN, this win would be the endorsement of the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his government; for PAS, it would have been a show that they can walk alone; and for Amanah, had it won, it would have showed that the new party has ‘arrived’.

However, Umno of BN won, and won big, even to their own amazement and they themselves admitted that they never thought the Chinese would have voted for them, for the Chinese tide seemed to be more for Amanah.

In Kuala Kangsar, BN candidate widow of former MP Datin Mastura Mohd Yazid received 12,653 votes, while Amanah and PAS’ candidates got 4,883 and 5,684 votes respectively. An independent candidates got only 54 votes. The majority was 6,969 votes.

In Sungai Besar,  BN candidate Budiman Mohd Zohdi received a whopping 16,800 votes, while Amanah and PAS’ candidates got 7,609 and 6,902 votes respectively. The majority was 9,191 votes.

An analysis showed that while BN got the Malay votes in hand, it managed to attract the Chinese votes this time round. The reason may be the rebellion of the Chinese in the two constituencies against the way the opposition played their campaign.

Amanah and PAS failed to attract Malay votes, while Amanah which the Chinese seemed interested in, was surprised that it did not get much from the community, to the extent one of its leaders blaming the Chinese for being bought over by goodies. Even Amanah’s candidates for both constituencies were orginally from there, they did not live there.

Amanah’s insistence to play up the racist rants to remind the Chinese that BN hates them – especially in Sungai Besar backfired. For one, Umno man Datuk Jamal Yunos had months before (even before the deaths of the former MPs), been shaking the hands of the Chinese and sought bigwig Umno leaders’ help for the release of the Chinese fisherman arrested in Indonesia.

He had even adopted the son of one of them, and he was working hard to better his image among the Chinese, for he was a local businessman who depended on the Chinese fishermen and his racist outburst had burnt him bad.

Thus, when billboards of ‘Cina Babi’ came up which was once said by Jamal (who seemed to have mended ties with the Chinese), it did not go down well with Chinese voters. Amanah, which had just moved into the neighbourhood did not realise the situation, and further, their candidate, although from Sungai Besar, did not live there.

Chinese then decided they had forgotten the bygones and they did not want anymore of this, thus they buried the hatchet and voted for Umno, to teach PAS and Amanah a lesson not to repeat racism even if it was said by others.

And the opposition too did not address the local issues, in constituencies where people worked hard for a living. Instead, they used it to champion their own grouses – with PKR’s Rafizi using the by-election to highlight the PM’s wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor’s abuse of her privileges and lambast 1MDB – which to many voters there is something that happened at the federal level. To them, these issues are something which they feel do not affect them directly, so is of no real concern.

While former PM Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad used it as a platform to talk about the Citizens’ Declaration, which is not much of interest to voters in places like Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar.

And PAS used it to champion their hudud and Islamist agenda. While DAP bigwigs came in with groceries and showed that they were no different from those who were buying their votes, but can DAP sustain the buy-out? Better to be bought by BN and be sustained, as BN was the government and they had money.

Amanah on the other hand was seen as just a splinter party of PAS, and although it received quite a number of votes more than PAS, it failed to its boasts that it will take over PAS. It claims it is no more seen as a mosquito party with such results, but the truth is, Amanah got sympathy votes.

While Umno and BN parties worked to promise goodies to the locals and the locale. Najib himself made a couple of trips and promised better things to come for the constituencies such as the RM43.5 million Manong bridge (which is a big thing for Kuala Kangsar residents) and a university, as well as rice and cash.

Umno worked hard to ensure that the local issues were addressed – and knowing fully well, it is all about bread and butter, dished out that very thing – bread and butter, to the extent of Najib announcing a Raya bonus for all civil servants.

Never mind if he was being dragged in mud for financial scandals, appeasing the voters was all the BN cared about and which BN knew had always been the best way to get votes, and it worked.

Unfortunately, the opposition tried to do the same – appeasing the voters with bread and butter, but voters knew that this goes against the very essence of the opposition – thus they decided to vote BN. A case of better the devil that you know.

There, simply put, Umno of BN managed to sweep both constituencies, not because the voters wanted them that much, but because in this double by-election, Umno and BN played their cards right, and the opposition parties blundered and fell on their face badly.