PAS In The Past

The main reason why (so it was said) there was objection within UMNO ranks to the selection of Tan Sri Isa as candidate for Bagan Pinang was that the victory which was in the bag, risked being tainted by the putrid smell of corruption. UMNO did no need to field Isa to win this seat...any decent candidate would have done the job.

Regardless of what PAS (PR) may have hoped, lets not be mistaken that the real fight was over the margin of loss that PAS would suffer. How did PAS hope to narrow the loss? It was hoping the Chinese and Indians are just as stupid as some of the PAS leaders. This time around PAS was shown the middle finger and that is what sitting on past March 8th laurels gets PAS. A middle finger that is just nice for the hole in the PAS logo.

If truth be told, speaking as a Chinese even I would have voted for UMNO if I was registered to vote in Bagan Pinang. Why not!?! Negeri Sembilan is a BN state and BN needed to win and retain this constituency as a showcase for GE13. The constituents of Bagan Pinang will benefit with UMNO compared to allowing it to fall to PAS (PR). This was almost the case in Manik Urai and the skin of the teeth 65 vote margin PAS victory would easily have been a reverse routing if Manik Urai is located anywhere else except Kelantan.

Yup! The Indians and the Chinese of Bagan Pinang did well to vote for UMNO and they did so with a clear conscience even if there were gifts galore! Why? Here's why...(from Malaysians Unplugged Blog and Hakim Joe in Malaysia Today)


Bagan Pinang By-Election: Chinese and Indian Voters Returned to UMNO/BN. Selangor PAS's Hassan Ali's Role in PAS's Disastrous Result
Monday, October 12, 2009

The Fall-Out on Neighbouring Negeri Sembilan PAS from Selangor PAS's Hassan Ali's PRO-UMNO Publicity Antics on:

• Beer Banning,
• Attacking fellow Exco DAP Ronnie Liu and
• His "Ketuanan Melayu" Support of the DOs against the Selangor Govt.

UMNO /BN Victory Came from Chinese and Indian Voters
Excerpts:
Read here for more

A landslide win for Mohd. Isa could only signify a few pertinent things. Bagan Pinang is a small township:

• It has three army camps and eight army outfits within its boundaries.
• It has registered voter base of 13,664 voters (14,192 in 2008) made up from 62.3% Malays, 20.7% Indians, 11% Chinese and 6% Others.
• Postal votes account for 33.7% of the total votes.
• The turnout according to the Election Commission is 81.65%.

The Election Result:

1. Mohd. Isa collected 8,013 votes (71.8 %). Of which, 3,521 came from postal votes (ie 31.6 %). To be fair, the postal votes were real killers. To win 85.4% of the postal votes or 31.6% of the total votes finished off whatever high hopes Pakatan dreamt of. Even if there were zero postal votes or if the votes were tied, Isa would nevertheless have had an easy romp home.
2. Zulkefly Mohamad Omar’s 2,578 votes. (28.2 %) He got only 601 from postal votes

The CHINESE and INDIANS Overwhelmingly Voted for Isa Samad
Look at the percentages. The figures do not lie.
The Malay vote only accounted for 62.3% but Mohd. Isa won by 71.8%. Hypothetically, if 80% of the Malays voted for Isa, that would mean that only 50% of the 71.8% is accounted for.
Where did the other 21.8% come from?
The answer is easy. It came from the Indian and Chinese voters.
The total of both the Indian and Chinese voters is 31.8%.
This means that more than two-thirds (68.6%) of Chinese and Indians voted for Mohd. Isa.
The swing back to BN is 14.2% (from 2008).
Implications for Pakatan Rakyat
Pakatan had better start doing something about it cos they need to win over such rural voters, and not just rely on the urban voters.
Relying on the non-Malay voters in Bagan Pinang was evidently disastrous.
In 2008, about 80% of the Indians and 65% of the Chinese voted opposition. (These figures are obtained from political analyst Dr Wan Abdul Rahman Wan Abdul Latiff.) That is approximately 74.8% non-Malays voting for the opposition. Now it has dropped to 31.4%.
What exactly happened here? Can the actions of one PAS Commissioner (in Selangor) be so damning on another PAS Commissioner (in Negeri Sembilan)?
Why are these state seats so important when the formation of the federal government is decided by parliamentary seats?
The answer is this – can Pakatan guarantee parliamentary victory during the next elections?
If the answer is in the negative, then it is these state governments that Pakatan must attempt to secure and subsequently be utilized as a home base to propagate the Opposition ideology and to inhibit the BN propaganda.
So, what does this BN victory means? It damn well means a lot of things but mostly,it means that :

1. Pakatan can no longer contend to split the Malay vote and allow the non-Malay vote to be the deciding factor.
2. The NON -Malay votes are not entirely swinging to the Opposition.
3. Rural voters are still voting for BN.
4. Time for Pakatan to start selecting their potential candidates now and permit them the time to start campaigning in their selected constituencies.
5. Pakatan needs to be more prominent in the rural constituencies.
6. Public spats between the three parties and party back stabbing are having a definite negative effect on the voters.

If Pakatan does nothing, the next election is as good as lost.
2013 is another 3 years plus of BN rule and Najib will be utilising this time to consolidate his position.
If Pakatan does not make any progress between now and then, it will be 2018 before anything can be done and who knows whether Malaysia will still be solvent then.