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Posted: 08 May 2013 03:53 PM PDT

Election aftermath could soon claim its real loser, the current PM

"We advised Najib against pandering to Chinese unreasonable requests. He bent over backwards to the Chinese where those resources could have gone to other rural or bumi constituencies. Now UMNO wants Najib to take responsibility."

John Berthelsen, Asia Sentinel

Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, having been instrumental in driving his successor Abdullah Ahmad Badawi from power in 2009 after a poor electoral performance, now may be poised to try to do the same thing to the current prime minister, Najib Tun Razak.

It may depend on whether Najib jumps or is pushed, however. The premier is said to be disillusioned and discouraged and may leave the premiership at the United Malays National Organization annual general meeting in October, handing over power to the current vice president Muhyiddin Yassin, sources say - if he lasts that long. Najib led the Barisan Nasional to its lowest vote total since independence at 46.66 percent of the popular vote to the Pakatan Rakyat coalition's 50.1 percent, taking a diminished 133 seats in the parliament to Pakatan Rakyat's 89 - amid allegations of voter irregularities that put the Barisan over the top.

"I am told that Najib will hand over to Muhyiddin in October," a lawyer with close contacts to UMNO said. "The change may finally come but voluntarily between Najib and Muhyiddin. We'll have to let it play it out some more."

That could foreshadow months of instability inside the UMNO leadership as a weakened Najib hangs on to power in the face of a wing of the party that wants to double down on the policies that have led to diminished returns in the last two elections. Toppling him now for Muhyiddin could well lead to costly party rifts, as it did in 2009 with the Badawi faction of the party. A change would probably signal that UMNO will steer to the conservative right, counterintuitive to what the electorate appears to have been saying. It was UMNO moderates such as Khairy Jamaluddin and Shahrir Samad who profited in the election while Malay nationalists Ibrahim Ali and Zulkifli Noordin were soundly defeated.

The Mahathir wing appears disdainful of Najib's 1Malaysia strategy, which calls for an emphasis on ethnic harmony and national unity. If anything, the 87-year-old former prime minister, with his sponsorship of the Malay nationalist NGO Perkasa, appears to be reverting to his days as a Malay firebrand that got him kicked out of UMNO for several years before he was reinstated by Najib's father, Tun Abdul Razak.

However, Mahathir, a source said, "campaigned hard for Najib and the Barisan Nasional. The Doc (Mahathir) let Najib do what he wanted pretty much. Najib led UMNO with his Economic Transformation Program, Government Transformation Program, etc. Now that the results weren't good Najib has to take responsibility. Most importantly, I get the sense that Najib was completely devastated and doesn't want the job anymore. Furthermore, Muhyiddin can fight fire with fire against DAP's race campaign."

It thus remains to be seen if Najib's ETP and GTP programs, the cornerstone of his government policy, are at risk, emphasizing as they do competitive bidding instead of special privileges for ethnic Malays. Muhyiddin, although not as strident as other Malay nationalists, nonetheless is closer to Mahathir's line of thinking than many are comfortable with.

Post-GE13: Where do we go from here?

Posted: 08 May 2013 01:32 PM PDT

Praba Ganesan, The Malaysian Insider

Most Malaysians want Pakatan Rakyat to rule the country. Until the next general election, Barisan Nasional (BN) will have to stomach this fact. Your mission, as the people or better said — the boss of this land — is to remind BN at every possible interval that that's the score, that's the reality. Fifty-two per cent of Malaysians want Pakatan Rakyat to govern.

The big question therefore is when will PRU-14 happen?

But before all that can we all stand up and applaud each other? Smile at your fellow citizen with pride and thank them for having the conviction in our democracy. Thank them for the love they have in abundance and willing to share.

Eighty-four per cent turnout at a GE is just phenomenal even if the 93 per cent show-up in some voting rooms (saluran) does give the eerie feeling that even the dead are not quite dead in Malaysia.

You gorgeous — living — people stood in the rain and sun, waited for your right without compromise and said to BN that we will not cower, we will not waver, and left with the message etched on the walls of the centres we voted in, that if we have to we will show up again to vote. The time to ignore us is over.

I'm writing here at Stadium Kelana Jaya as an expectant crowd builds up in the rain to hear Anwar Ibrahim speak for the first time at a rally after the polls.

EC has to do a Houdini

The Election Commission (EC) does not have a leg to stand on anymore. The indelible ink was a lie. In 2008 they said the ink's integrity was in doubt, so they did not use it. On Sunday, after eight years of debate, pleading, meetings, conventions and delegations, the EC showed that it truly don't really care what so many citizens want, a free and fair election.

Millions of key witnesses can bear testimony that the EC tried to deceive the public about the ink being indelible. It all washed and it washed off quick.

And five days prior to election, on the day of early votes, hundreds bold enough to speak out and risk their lifespan as men and women in uniform said the ink failed.

The EC pooh-poohed them and insisted that it was just about shaking the bottle more. The sheer arrogance of just telling everyone off was and still remains an alarming statement on the state of free and fair elections here.

Second, the postal and early votes gave only 10 per cent support to Pakatan. Even in 2008 it was 20-30 per cent and this time Pakatan was promised that the process will be improved in order to include media and overseas voters, and less coercion on the men in uniform and their family members.

But in the end a record low was registered. How? Are we to think that with less coercion, and an overwhelming number of Malaysians abroad already saying openly that they voted Pakatan and critical media employees, nine out of 10 of them voted for BN?

And more and more horror stories will be arriving and the EC it appears to me is buying time, hoping that my countrymen cannot remember or just get distracted with their own lives to realise that the body given the job to protect their democratic rights went to do the exact opposite.

No explanation will do, and that the EC chief has not been sacked is proof that Najib Razak is not for free and fair elections.

He is prime minister, and the EC is under him not Parliament. He speaks of reconciliation, therefore he must back his statement by axing the man who failed the democratic needs of the people Najib governs now.

Time for Malaysian leadership, Najib.

READ MORE HERE

Why BN lost the urban votes

Posted: 08 May 2013 01:07 PM PDT

The reason that Chinese are more visible as a bloc is because Chinese Malaysians predominantly reside in urban areas. Urban sentiments are against BN, for reasons which I will touch on below, resulting in most Chinese voting for the opposition. But in rural areas like Kedah, I was told many Chinese voted for BN.

Hsu Dar Ren, The Malaysian Insider

In an earlier article, by way of simple mathematics, I showed that in fact more non-Chinese Malaysians voted against BN than Chinese Malaysians in the just concluded 13th general election.

It is true that the Chinese voted as a bloc, with an estimated 80 per cent for Pakatan Rakyat. But at most, because they are a minority, they can cause only a ripple, maybe a small wave, but never a tsunami.

It is because of the other urban Malaysians, such as the urban Malays in Batu, Shah Alam, Puchong, Lembah Pantai, Wangsa Maju and everywhere else who voted against BN that resulted in the mini tsunami.

Now that the election is over, the prime minister has talked about national reconciliation.

I welcome that. Yes, this is the time for reconciliation and healing, but to do so, first of all, we must stop all racial rhetoric and the blame game, and sit down and analyse why BN lost so much of ground in urban areas.

I will name a few reasons:

1. 1 Malaysia and Perkasa. While there was initially high hope for the PM's 1 Malaysia vision, it was very fast negated by the rise of right-wing extremists in Umno in the form of outsourced NGO Perkasa.

While ordinary people would be hauled up for small offences, big wigs in Perkasa go scot free and were perceived to be given a licence to utter racist and extreme views.

The free hand given to Perkasa and its patron negated the PM's effort to push for 1 Malaysia, which is a pity of course. In the minds of many urban people, 1 Malaysia has just become a slogan to be uttered loudly whenever there is a government event or in the presence of government leaders.

Thus, to many urban people the best result this time around was the defeat of racists such as Ibrahim Ali and Zulklifli Noordin, both of whom are seen to be linked to Dr Tun Mahathir Mohamad. The fact that they lost in predominantly Malay areas showed that even the Malays do not buy this type of extremism anymore. Their defeat should be something for BN and Umno to reflect deeply and seriously.

While BN accuses others of being racists, they should look in the mirror at themselves, and see why these racists were fielded and aided. It is akin to acknowledging that BN supports extremism. On top of that, there is Utusan Malaysia, which time and again carries extremist views but nothing was done to curb it.

While heads of some component parties of BN did come out with statements to condemn Perkasa and Utusan every time they uttered something extreme, they were seen to be inert in stopping these extremist views even with their so-called internal channels to the PM and BN supreme council. Their inertness was interpreted as total subservience to Umno's hegemony.

If they are seen to be subservient, then how can they be effective in representing the interest of urbanites, given that their seats were mainly in urban areas? To the urban people, these component parties have totally lost relevance by their inability to moderate such extremism and double standards.

Race-based politics is on the way out. To those who have access to the Internet, race is no more an issue. The Internet community is actually those who reside in urban and affluent suburban areas. The urban tsunami can therefore also be seen as the Tsunami of the Internet Community.

BN needs to be more farsighted and look beyond race. BN should really consider disbanding each individual component and merge into one big multiracial party without harping on Malay rights and supporting those who utter extremist religious views.

READ MORE HERE

Pakatan lost, but not defeated

Posted: 08 May 2013 01:01 PM PDT

Lim Sue Goan, Sin Chew

Although Pakatan Rakyat has failed to achieve the regime change target in the 13th general election, the next general election would be more favourable if it ploughs its political fields deeper in multiracial areas.

It seems that Pakatan Rakyat has suffered a setback and some of its leaders might not be able to sustain for another five years due to their age. The whole pattern, however, allows Pakatan Rakyat to expand its political map if the BN fails to implement more reforms.

First of all, Pakatan Rakyat obtained 51.4 per cent of popular vote while BN gained only 48.6 per cent. This is due to a wide voter population in some constituencies. As urbanisation has been accelerated, BN's advantage in rural areas would be gradually reduced.

Secondly, the number of young voters has increased.

There were 2.6 million new voters this year. Given this figure, in another five years, together with another group of new voters and a lower number of old voters, Pakatan Rakyat would still be in the favourable position.

Thirdly, Datuk Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat's retirement has reflected the emergence of young leaders in Pakatan Rakyat.

BN would be unable to demarcate constituencies according to its own preference, including some states where it has lost the ruling advantage, after failing to gain a two-thirds majority in Parliament. In addition, BN must also find a way to fight for the support of urban voters, young voters and non-Malay voters, or it would not be able to make headway in the long run.

It is a normal phenomenon to have voices accusing Chinese voters after the election. However, racialising the election result is not conducive to BN's effort in restoring public confidence. It is believed that BN leaders who have a clear understanding of the overall situation would suppress the voices and continue the pace of democratisation.

From the election result, although the DAP is the big winner among the three component parties of Pakatan Rakyat, while PAS has suffered a setback, they did not lose their bases. Instead, they have gained more state seats in Penang, Kelantan and Selangor.

The three component parties of Pakatan Rakyat have their respective states and are expanding their influence to neighbouring areas. It is consistent with the idea of equal status. Theoretically, it will be difficult for BN to regain Penang and Selangor as long as Pakatan Rakyat is able to rule the states for two terms to consolidate its power.

The DAP won 10 more parliamentary seats while the PKR and PAS lost one and two seats respectively. It is a pity that liberal leaders in PAS have been defeated, like party deputy president Mohamad Sabu, vice-president Datuk Husam Musa and Salahuddin Ayub. However, with its strong grassroots PAS should be able to revive.

PAS's performance is not as good as expected mainly because it was defeated in Kedah. It lost five parliamentary seats in Kedah due to the return of votes to Umno, the previous PAS state government's poor governance and party internal problems.

It is favourable to Pakatan Rakyat as the political situation in some states has changed. For instance, Pakatan Rakyat won five parliamentary seats and 18 state seats in Johor, three parliamentary seats and 11 state seats in Sabah and four parliamentary seats and 12 state seats in Pahang, breaking the BN's deposit statehood. Pakatan Rakyat has also set off a wind of anti-establishment among the Kadazan, Dusun, and Murut communities in Sabah. At the same time, BN lost the two-thirds majority advantage and was able to win Terengganu and Perak by a narrow margin.

Therefore, Pakatan Rakyat has made a big improvement in Sunday's election. It should now play a supervisory role and professionally perform its task, while looking forward to the next general election.

If Pakatan Rakyat has evidence of electoral fraud, it should bring it to the courts and fight through legal channels. Reducing street protests will be more conducive to its efforts of securing support.

A healthy competition between the two coalitions would be a blessing for the country and its people.

Kredit: www.malaysia-today.net

Khamis, 9 Mei 2013

Malaysia Today - Your Source of Independent News

Malaysia Today - Your Source of Independent News

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