No choice for BN but to field young candidates, says analyst

 

James Chin (left) said BN cannot ignore fielding younger candidates while Ahmad Fauzi Abdul Hamid felt the BN-Umno brand will prevail this time.

PETALING JAYA: Barisan Nasional risks facing a backlash from Johor voters if it fails to field young and fresh faces as candidates in the upcoming state election, says an analyst.

James Chin of the University of Tasmania’s Asia Institute said nominating new faces as candidates was crucial as there was a general discontent with the current political class among voters.

He said at least 70% of the candidates should be new and young, “If I were (BN chairman) Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, I would go with 80% or 90% new faces,” he told FMT.

Zahid would find it difficult to ignore the need for fresh candidates because more than 750,000 young voters had been added to the electoral roll.

“He really has no choice. The pressure is to have some younger candidates overall in order to appeal to the new voters.”

On the role of former prime minister Najib Razak in the election, Chin said many will be monitoring his role closely to see whether the ex-Umno president will have as big a say as he had in Melaka last November.

Earlier this week, Zahid said BN will not be using the same “mould” it applied in the Melaka state elections in Johor, including its formula for selecting candidates.

He said 87% of BN’s candidates in Melaka were new, 84% of them had high qualifications and those aged below 50 constituted over 82%. However, the political landscape was different in Johor.

Ahmad Fauzi Abdul Hamid of Universiti Sains Malaysia said the change of strategy from Melaka reflected BN’s confidence in forming the next state government on its own after the polls.

He told FMT that Johor had more rural and Felda constituencies that have been Umno strongholds for a long time, adding that it was still difficult to tell how the new, young voters will cast their ballot.

“Barring any nationwide scandal such as 1MDB, it looks very unlikely that the BN-Umno brand will fail them this time.

“The reason for calling state elections appears to be rooted in their confidence of establishing complete dominance of the state administration, without having to share power with Perikatan Nasional. This is irrespective of there being a low or high voter turnout,” he said. - FMT