IT WILL TAKE A MIRACLE FOR DAP TO WIN CAMERONS, ADMITS KIT SIANG – EVEN AS PAS, WHICH FIRED RACIAL & BIGOTED ATTACKS AT NON-MUSLIMS OVER SUBANG TEMPLE RIOT, OFFERS TO SET UP MACHINERY TO ASSIST MIC CANDIDATE

PAS will set up its own election machinery to assist MIC in the Cameron Highlands by-election, said Takiyuddin Hassan.

“We will run our own activities and coordinate with the MIC team to help them retain this seat,” the PAS secretary-general told The Malaysian Insight today.

Takiyuddin, who is the Kota Baru MP, said the party is confident Barisan Nasional can retain the seat as the GE14 winning margin was slim.

“Our candidate (Wan Mahadir Wan Mahmud) received 3,587 votes last year. Added to the BN votes, the seat is within reach,” he said.

The Islamist party is sitting out the by-election and building on its ties with the ethnic Indian party.

Last year, the MIC’s top leaders met with the PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang and its senior leaders on improving ties and finding common ground against Pakatan Harapan.

In the last elections, MIC’s Sivarraajh Chandran won by 597 votes after picking up 10,307 votes compared with DAP’s M. Manogaran (9,710), PAS’ Wan Mahadir (3,587), PSM’s Suresh Kumar Balasubramaniam (680) and Berjasa’s Mohd Tahir Kassim (81).

Turnout was 76% or 24,365 out of 32,048 voters in the last elections.

The by-election, which begins with nominations on January 12, was triggered after the election court overturned the results on November 30 after ruling that Sivarraajh had bought votes.

Sivarraajh, however, will not be re-contesting the seat after the Election Commission decided last week that the MIC vice-president was ineligible as he was implicated in corrupt practices to win the parliamentary seat last May.

Takiyuddin said the party will be meeting in the “next few days” to decide who will lead the PAS machinery in Cameron Highlands.

While it was too early to confirm whether PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang will take part in the campaign, Takiyuddin said deputy president Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man is likely to take part.

DAP ‘underdogs’ in Cameron Highlands by-election, says Kit Siang

DAP “will be the underdog” in the Cameron Highlands by-election on January 26, the party’s stalwart Lim Kit Siang declared today.

“It will be a miracle if DAP – Pakatan Harapan can win but we are in the era of miracles,”   the Iskandar Puteri MP said, alluding to the result of the general election last year where the seemingly invincible Umno and the Barisan Nasional coalition it led, was ousted after 60 years in power.

“So we must dare to dream and work for of another miracle next month,” he said today following a gathering at an Orang Asli village of Semoi Lama at Pos Lenyang in Cameron Highlands.

Yesterday, party secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said the party is set for a tough fight in the by-election as the Pahang parliamentary seat has always been held by MIC.

“It will be a tough fight because MIC, which has always held the seat, has the upper hand.

“The seat has long been MIC’s, and has never been won by DAP or PH,”   the DAP secretary-general said yesterday.

Kit Siang said while DAP had won the majority support of Chinese and Indian voters in the 14th general election, it secured only minority support from Malay and Orang Asli voters.

PH’s challenge in the Cameron Highlands by-election, the Iskandar Puteri MP said, is therefore to maintain the support of the Chinese and Indians voters on one hand, while increasing the support of Malay and Orang Asli voters “until we could cross the majority mark by one or both of these two groups”.

“If we can do this, then the DAP-Pakatan Harapan by-election workers in the Cameron Highlands will be miracle-workers.”

The by-election for the Cameron Highlands seat was called after the Election Court on November 30 declared that BN’s victory in the constituency of 32,009 voters in GE14 was null and void as corrupt practices had been taken to influence voters there.

The court found MIC vice-president C. Sivarraajh, who won the seat, guilty of giving bribes of between RM30 and RM1,000 to the Orang Asli community prior to the election in the election petition filed by the defeated DAP candidate M. Manogaran.

Sivarraajh, who is ineligible to contest in the by-election and also barred from registering as a voter or candidate for any election for a period of five years from December 13, 2018, had polled 10,307 votes to win the seat with a majority of 597 votes in a five-cornered contest in GE14.

The other candidates were Manogaran, who secured 9,710 votes; Wan Mahadir Wan Mahmud of PAS (3,587 votes); Mohd Tahir Kassim of Berjasa (81 votes), and B. Suresh Kumar of PSM (680 votes).

Manogaran, 59, filed an election petition on June 4 seeking a court order to declare the election null and void for violations under the Election Offences Act.

Early voting in the by-election will be on January 22.

The contest is expected to be a straight fight between the DAP and BN as PAS has already said it will sit out the contest.

Lim said the Orang Asli, even though they are the first inhabitants in the country, have become the “most neglected community in the country after six decades of nation-building”.

“It is time that all Malaysians from all communities and religions unite as one powerful force to uplift and catapult the Orang Asli community into the 21st century and wipe out this shame and blot on Malaysia’s development history,” he said.

“They cannot get access to the most basic necessities which they are entitled to as citizens of Malaysia, whether in medical aid, educational and economic opportunities, basic infrastructure facilities of clean water and electricity, and most important of all to them, land rights.

“This is indeed a great shame for Malaysia which boasts as a modern developed country.”

– https://www.themalaysianinsight.com