In what is seen as another slap in the face for the Najib administration, a prominent law university in the UK will confer an honorary doctorate on Bersih chief Ambiga Sreenevasan.
The 55-year old Ambiga's plate is already full, having also been honoured as one of the world's 8 receipients of the prestigious US International Women of Courage Award some two years back. But the doctorate from the UK's University of Exeter is the icing on the cake.
Certainly, the past few months have been tough for Ambiga, who received threats on her life. Blogs aligned to Prime Minister Najib Razak's UMNO party were so uncouth as to even threaten her with "gang-rape" if she did not cancel the Bersih 2.0 rally for free and fair elections, which was held on July 9.
Thus, her triumph is all the more celebrated by Bersih supporters and her well-wishers.
“She is well regarded by most of her peers and enjoys the ear of many of the judges,†Malaysian Insider reported prominent lawyer Tommy Thomas as saying.
“There is no way anyone today can describe her without mentioning Bersih. I’m sure the person from University of Exeter who had a hand in her nomination will do the same. She is Malaysia’s best-known personality today."
Different rewards for different principles
Ambiga reportedly left for London during the weekend, around the time that Najib and his entourage went to Rome to see the Pope.
In London for a 4-day official visit that began late last week, Najib was greeted by angry Malaysian diaspora who wore the yellow Bersih T-shirt to show him what they though of his high-handed actions against the July 9 civilians march.
Bersih 2.0 is a coalition of 62 top NGOs, chaired by Ambiga, and formed for the purpose of creating public awareness and demand for free and fair elections in Malaysia's notoriouly corrupt and distorted system.
An angered Najib ordered an unprecedented crackdown, and on rally day, thousands were injured and one left dead. Nearly 2,000 have been arrested over Bersih and 6 politicians remain in detention without trial under an archaic Emergency law.
The Malaysian PM has been chastised by the United Nations, the US and snubbed by the British Queen, who wore a stunningly yellow dress at the royal audience. Her attire sent an enormous cheer amongst everyday Malaysians, who took it as a sign of solidarity with their efforts to transform their society.
"Thanks to the Najib administration's actions, Bersih 2.0 has been transformed into one of the best-known organisations," said Tommy.
Malaysia Chronicle
Showing posts with label By Elections. Show all posts
Showing posts with label By Elections. Show all posts
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Monday, November 08, 2010
Another Malaysian By-Election
A longtime dissident returns to the tricky job of leading UMNO efforts in Kelantan
The result of Malaysia's 12th by-election to occur since tumultuous national elections in 2008 is in practical terms irrelevant. Whether or not Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS) retains the state seat of Galas on Nov. 4 by-election will make no difference to the Islamic party's control of the state legislature.
But it will be a test of the influence of the United Malays National Organisation's most distinguished internal dissident, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, and his calls for sweeping reform of Umno. Galas is part of Razaleigh's federal parliamentary constituency and is centered on his home town of Gua Musang in the south of the state. And, together with a federal seat by-election on the same day, the election is expected to play a role in whether Prime Minister Najib Razak will go to national polls in early 2011.
But interpreting the Galas result will not be easy. The 73-year old Razaleigh, usually known as Ku Li, is between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand the Kelantan aristocrat knows that his calls for reform of Umno are unlikely to make much progress if the erosion of support for the Umno-led Barisan Nasional ruling coalition that was seen both in the 2008 federal election and in subsequent bye-elections is stemmed or reversed.
On the other hand Razaleigh has no choice but to support his own party and the candidate he himself chose in this local election. Recognizing his difficult position, Razaleigh has been playing down the significance of the election. But there is little doubting the attention it has been getting in the media because of him.
Ministers in the government that Razaleigh relentlessly criticizes have been trooping to Gua Musang to kiss his hand and try to shore up Barisan support among the voters. They too doubtless have mixed feelings, one the one hand needing to show Umno making a comeback, on the other worried about the enhanced reputation Razalaigh may acquire should Umno poll well here but not elsewhere.
Razaleigh, once billed as bapak ekonomi or "father of the Malaysian economy" for his role running Pernas, which was created to encourage Malay-controlled businesses in 1975, as well as creating the national energy company Petronas and then as Finance Minister, but who has been out of power since narrowly losing to Mahathir in 1987, may have little clout in today's UMNO or following in its higher echelons. But his stringing criticisms of corruption in the Barisan and of Umno's hypocritical attempts to compete with PAS on religious issues have found a ready audience in a wider community. For all of Prime Minister Najib's talk of his 1Malaysia slogan, many in Umno continue to pander to more extreme views of Malay and Muslim supremacy that are being peddled by the chauvinist Perkasa movement and aided and abetted by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. Razaleigh's criticisms of the Barisan have been getting plenty of media coverage, a privilege not so available to opposition parties.
The odds are certainly stacked against a national comeback by Razaleigh. Yet in the event that Anwar Ibrahim ends back in jail at the same time the opposition still does well in the election, moderate elements from all races might look to him as representative of an older and more tolerant version of UMNO as existed, at least in many minds, before Mahathir's reign.
What is far from clear is whether the voters in Galas, and particularly the Chinese (20 percent) and Orang Asli (aboriginals, 16 percent ) who deserted the Barisan in the last election come back to it. On the one hand both are known to respect Razaleigh personally and like his inclusivist views on racial and religious issues. On the other hand the Chinese may have yet to be convinced that at the national level the 1Malaysia slogan is more than rhetoric, or that the Malaysian Chinese Association is a credible member of the Barisan.
As for the Orang Asli, traditional Barisan supporters, they have been wooed by a state government which promises to prevent further shrinkage of their traditional lands as a result of acquisitions by members of the Kelantan royal family and other well-placed persons.
As it controls the state government, PAS itself has been buying loyalties through grants of state lands and has been vigorously attacking the federal government for its denial of the Kelantan state government's proper share in oil royalties. This ill-conceived Mahathir-era punishment for electing an opposition government does UMNO no favors. But at least Razaleigh is not tainted by it. As the author of the 1974 legislation that provided for a royalty to the states he has backed Kelantan's claim against the federal government.
However, Nov. 4 will test whether support for Razaleigh overrides deep national dissatisfaction with the Barisan, which Razaleigh himself believes shows no signs of abating. Indeed within Umno there are now those who think that it could lose control of the majority of state governments.
But others believe that Najib has sufficiently steadied the Umno/Barisan ship that he can look to an election in the first half of 2011, perhaps to coincide with state elections due next year in Sarawak. The economy is doing well enough thanks to high oil, rubber and palm oil prices – and government spending. There have been no major racial incidents such as Hindu temple destructions and cow head displays to upset minorities.
Anwar is preoccupied with his legal problems and without him the opposition has no unifying focus. So the issue is whether people will just vote against the Barisan rather than for the opposition. An election two years before one is due would be a risk for Najib, but even modest success would strengthen his position in Umno and in particular make it less difficult to translate the One Malaysia slogan into policies.
However, reading the results of the by-elections will not be easy given the Razaleigh factor in Galas and that politics in ethnically diverse Sabah, as in Sarawak, are not necessarily a guide to what happens in Peninsular Malaysia. So whatever the result, the significance of a by-election involving just 11,553 voters may be debated long after Thursday.
The result of Malaysia's 12th by-election to occur since tumultuous national elections in 2008 is in practical terms irrelevant. Whether or not Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS) retains the state seat of Galas on Nov. 4 by-election will make no difference to the Islamic party's control of the state legislature.
But it will be a test of the influence of the United Malays National Organisation's most distinguished internal dissident, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, and his calls for sweeping reform of Umno. Galas is part of Razaleigh's federal parliamentary constituency and is centered on his home town of Gua Musang in the south of the state. And, together with a federal seat by-election on the same day, the election is expected to play a role in whether Prime Minister Najib Razak will go to national polls in early 2011.
But interpreting the Galas result will not be easy. The 73-year old Razaleigh, usually known as Ku Li, is between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand the Kelantan aristocrat knows that his calls for reform of Umno are unlikely to make much progress if the erosion of support for the Umno-led Barisan Nasional ruling coalition that was seen both in the 2008 federal election and in subsequent bye-elections is stemmed or reversed.
On the other hand Razaleigh has no choice but to support his own party and the candidate he himself chose in this local election. Recognizing his difficult position, Razaleigh has been playing down the significance of the election. But there is little doubting the attention it has been getting in the media because of him.
Ministers in the government that Razaleigh relentlessly criticizes have been trooping to Gua Musang to kiss his hand and try to shore up Barisan support among the voters. They too doubtless have mixed feelings, one the one hand needing to show Umno making a comeback, on the other worried about the enhanced reputation Razalaigh may acquire should Umno poll well here but not elsewhere.
Razaleigh, once billed as bapak ekonomi or "father of the Malaysian economy" for his role running Pernas, which was created to encourage Malay-controlled businesses in 1975, as well as creating the national energy company Petronas and then as Finance Minister, but who has been out of power since narrowly losing to Mahathir in 1987, may have little clout in today's UMNO or following in its higher echelons. But his stringing criticisms of corruption in the Barisan and of Umno's hypocritical attempts to compete with PAS on religious issues have found a ready audience in a wider community. For all of Prime Minister Najib's talk of his 1Malaysia slogan, many in Umno continue to pander to more extreme views of Malay and Muslim supremacy that are being peddled by the chauvinist Perkasa movement and aided and abetted by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. Razaleigh's criticisms of the Barisan have been getting plenty of media coverage, a privilege not so available to opposition parties.
The odds are certainly stacked against a national comeback by Razaleigh. Yet in the event that Anwar Ibrahim ends back in jail at the same time the opposition still does well in the election, moderate elements from all races might look to him as representative of an older and more tolerant version of UMNO as existed, at least in many minds, before Mahathir's reign.
What is far from clear is whether the voters in Galas, and particularly the Chinese (20 percent) and Orang Asli (aboriginals, 16 percent ) who deserted the Barisan in the last election come back to it. On the one hand both are known to respect Razaleigh personally and like his inclusivist views on racial and religious issues. On the other hand the Chinese may have yet to be convinced that at the national level the 1Malaysia slogan is more than rhetoric, or that the Malaysian Chinese Association is a credible member of the Barisan.
As for the Orang Asli, traditional Barisan supporters, they have been wooed by a state government which promises to prevent further shrinkage of their traditional lands as a result of acquisitions by members of the Kelantan royal family and other well-placed persons.
As it controls the state government, PAS itself has been buying loyalties through grants of state lands and has been vigorously attacking the federal government for its denial of the Kelantan state government's proper share in oil royalties. This ill-conceived Mahathir-era punishment for electing an opposition government does UMNO no favors. But at least Razaleigh is not tainted by it. As the author of the 1974 legislation that provided for a royalty to the states he has backed Kelantan's claim against the federal government.
However, Nov. 4 will test whether support for Razaleigh overrides deep national dissatisfaction with the Barisan, which Razaleigh himself believes shows no signs of abating. Indeed within Umno there are now those who think that it could lose control of the majority of state governments.
But others believe that Najib has sufficiently steadied the Umno/Barisan ship that he can look to an election in the first half of 2011, perhaps to coincide with state elections due next year in Sarawak. The economy is doing well enough thanks to high oil, rubber and palm oil prices – and government spending. There have been no major racial incidents such as Hindu temple destructions and cow head displays to upset minorities.
Anwar is preoccupied with his legal problems and without him the opposition has no unifying focus. So the issue is whether people will just vote against the Barisan rather than for the opposition. An election two years before one is due would be a risk for Najib, but even modest success would strengthen his position in Umno and in particular make it less difficult to translate the One Malaysia slogan into policies.
However, reading the results of the by-elections will not be easy given the Razaleigh factor in Galas and that politics in ethnically diverse Sabah, as in Sarawak, are not necessarily a guide to what happens in Peninsular Malaysia. So whatever the result, the significance of a by-election involving just 11,553 voters may be debated long after Thursday.
Asia Sentinel.com
Sunday, May 02, 2010
Zaid Ibrahim Blasts Election Irregularities in Malaysia
The April 25 by-election, he says, was rife with election abuse
Zaid Ibrahim, the Malaysia opposition coalition standard-bearer who lost a by-election last Sunday to P Kamalanathan, a Malaysian Indian Congress spokesman, coalition, has issued a blistering statement charging the national ruling coalition with "blatant bribery starting from…party workers right up to the Prime Minister himself."
Zaid, a prominent Kuala Lumpur lawyer and onetime justice minister under former Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi who left the United Malays National Organisation to join the Parti Keadilan Rakyat headed by opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, called on international observers to monitor future elections in the country. The opposition lost the race in the Hulu Selangor constituency northeast of Kuala Lumpur by 1,725 votes.
Other observers said both sides had used the power of government to attempt to influence the results. The Pakatan Rakyat coalition, composed of Parti Keadilan, the ethnic Chinese Democratic Action Party and the Islamic fundamentalist Parti Islam se-Malaysia, won control of the government in Selangor in the 2008 national election. Certainly in the past, UMNO has shown no hesitation at promising contracts to likely voters, used government-owned transport to move voters to the polls and taken many other steps to seek to ensure victory although vote-counting has largely remained clean and fair.
Kim Quek, a Pakatan Rakyat spokesman, charged in his own message that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak "made innumerable on-the-spot grants of cash and promises of goodies (many were conditional upon a Barisan Nasional win) that ran easily to hundreds of millions of ringgit during that compact campaign period. These included the construction of a university and several schools, an expressway interchange and many other infrastructures, several low-cost housing projects, upgrading of mosques and temples, grants to community guilds and associations, cash payments to individuals etc."
In particular, Quek wrote, Najib himself handed RM5 million (US$1.56 million) in cash to 10 100 rural dwellers being resettled by Malaysia's Federal Land Development Authority. The settlers, Quek wrote, were among victims of a failed project committed to a private developer 15 years ago.
Zaid's loss was a setback for the Pakatan Rakyat coalition.which has been suffering increasing attrition as party functionaries leave and return to the UMNO, from whence many of them had come before the 2008 election. Zaid was being seen as the logical successor to Anwar if the opposition leader goes to jail in what has become known as Sodomy II after a former aide charged him with sexual perversion.
Zaid charged that voters' names had been removed from electoral rolls, that others had been intimidated, bribed or given other inducements to influence their choice. He said his legal team would file an election petition against the poll, which took place in the Hulu Selangor constituency northeast of Kuala Lumpur. He said he would also sue the country's election commission.
"The conduct of free and fair elections is the constitutional duty of the Election Commission," Zaid wrote. "I maintain that they have violated that duty in the recent by-election. They have allowed intimidation, false information, and unfair and illegal electoral practices by the Barisan Nasional machinery without any attempt to stop them. In fact, it was obvious to me that the Election Commission was on the side of Barisan Nasional and wanting Barisan Nasional to win."
He said he also intends to file suit against the UMNO-controlled Utusan Malaysia newspaper for calling him a kaki botol or drunk. "I was never an alcoholic," he said. "Whatever I consumed was no more than whatever (former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad) and other UMNO leaders had consumed. The Election Commission should not have allowed for such a malicious and false campaign."
The opposition, he said, would launch a "Pakatan International Support group" in London in July to seek international support for free and fair elections in Malaysia. He invited overseas Malaysians to provide information to other countries and international organizations on what he described as election excesses in the country.
AsiaSentinel.com
Zaid Ibrahim, the Malaysia opposition coalition standard-bearer who lost a by-election last Sunday to P Kamalanathan, a Malaysian Indian Congress spokesman, coalition, has issued a blistering statement charging the national ruling coalition with "blatant bribery starting from…party workers right up to the Prime Minister himself."
Zaid, a prominent Kuala Lumpur lawyer and onetime justice minister under former Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi who left the United Malays National Organisation to join the Parti Keadilan Rakyat headed by opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, called on international observers to monitor future elections in the country. The opposition lost the race in the Hulu Selangor constituency northeast of Kuala Lumpur by 1,725 votes.
Other observers said both sides had used the power of government to attempt to influence the results. The Pakatan Rakyat coalition, composed of Parti Keadilan, the ethnic Chinese Democratic Action Party and the Islamic fundamentalist Parti Islam se-Malaysia, won control of the government in Selangor in the 2008 national election. Certainly in the past, UMNO has shown no hesitation at promising contracts to likely voters, used government-owned transport to move voters to the polls and taken many other steps to seek to ensure victory although vote-counting has largely remained clean and fair.
Kim Quek, a Pakatan Rakyat spokesman, charged in his own message that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak "made innumerable on-the-spot grants of cash and promises of goodies (many were conditional upon a Barisan Nasional win) that ran easily to hundreds of millions of ringgit during that compact campaign period. These included the construction of a university and several schools, an expressway interchange and many other infrastructures, several low-cost housing projects, upgrading of mosques and temples, grants to community guilds and associations, cash payments to individuals etc."
In particular, Quek wrote, Najib himself handed RM5 million (US$1.56 million) in cash to 10 100 rural dwellers being resettled by Malaysia's Federal Land Development Authority. The settlers, Quek wrote, were among victims of a failed project committed to a private developer 15 years ago.
Zaid's loss was a setback for the Pakatan Rakyat coalition.which has been suffering increasing attrition as party functionaries leave and return to the UMNO, from whence many of them had come before the 2008 election. Zaid was being seen as the logical successor to Anwar if the opposition leader goes to jail in what has become known as Sodomy II after a former aide charged him with sexual perversion.
Zaid charged that voters' names had been removed from electoral rolls, that others had been intimidated, bribed or given other inducements to influence their choice. He said his legal team would file an election petition against the poll, which took place in the Hulu Selangor constituency northeast of Kuala Lumpur. He said he would also sue the country's election commission.
"The conduct of free and fair elections is the constitutional duty of the Election Commission," Zaid wrote. "I maintain that they have violated that duty in the recent by-election. They have allowed intimidation, false information, and unfair and illegal electoral practices by the Barisan Nasional machinery without any attempt to stop them. In fact, it was obvious to me that the Election Commission was on the side of Barisan Nasional and wanting Barisan Nasional to win."
He said he also intends to file suit against the UMNO-controlled Utusan Malaysia newspaper for calling him a kaki botol or drunk. "I was never an alcoholic," he said. "Whatever I consumed was no more than whatever (former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad) and other UMNO leaders had consumed. The Election Commission should not have allowed for such a malicious and false campaign."
The opposition, he said, would launch a "Pakatan International Support group" in London in July to seek international support for free and fair elections in Malaysia. He invited overseas Malaysians to provide information to other countries and international organizations on what he described as election excesses in the country.
AsiaSentinel.com
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Malaysia's Crucial By-Election Test
Malaysia's fundamentalist opposition Parti Islam se-Malaysia appears increasingly likely to win the country's next by-election in the first poll that might actually start to realign power, despairing United Malays National Organisation insiders say.
"UMNO may lose the seat and start the demise of the party," said a disillusioned party stalwart, although other observers point out that the ruling national coalition has a built-in edge from military and police voters.
The seat came open in the state of Negeri Sembilan with the sudden death of UMNO state lawmaker Azman Mohd Noor from blood poisoning in early September. Although it is a seat in a relatively obscure state legislature, if PAS takes it in the Oct. 11 by-election in what had been an UMNO stronghold, observers in Kuala Lumpur say, it will be a convincing demonstration that the fundamentalist Islamic party is breaking out of its rural stronghold on the eastern side of the country and that its power is growing.
UMNO is banking on the hope that of the 14,000 voters in the constituency, 5,700 are absentee postal voters, most of them soldiers and policemen, whose vote usually goes to the Barisan Nasional. The district is about 60 mi. south of the Kuala Lumpur conurbation.
The election comes at a time when Malaysia is suffering from a variety of economic, ethnic, religious and cultural strains that are being exacerbated by political maneuvering between the opposition Pakatan Rakyat coalition and the ruling Barisan Nasional. Annual gross domestic product fell a stunning 6.2 percent in the first quarter of 2009 as the world financial crisis disrupted Malaysia's export-oriented economy. GDP continued to fall by 3.9 percent in the second quarter, killing job growth despite a massive fiscal stimulus package and accommodative fiscal policy from Bank Negara, the country's central bank.
"They say it's turning around, but a lot of people are losing their jobs, this (Eid Ul Fitri, the end of the fasting month) people are not spending, many companies are opting for early retirement for their workers," said a Kuala Lumpur-based lawyer. "Hopefully (the fiscal package) does kick in soon, but I doubt it on the ground. It is going to hurt."
As part of that fiscal stimulus, development spending is expected to hit RM55 billion (US$15.8 billion) for all of 2009 and rise to RM58 billion for 2010. However, construction spending is a double-edged sword. Malaysia's construction companies are closely aligned to UMNO and increasingly jaded voters are concerned that the spoils will go to fat-cat cronies of the politicians.
Given these problems, PAS has emerged as a political powerhouse in urban areas as ethnic Malays have turned away from the scandal-ridden UMNO, attracted by PAS's stated clean-government aims despite its strict fundamentalist policies. The party has been feeling its oats around Kuala Lumpur, seeking to ban beer sales in Malay areas and, most recently, pushing authorities to seeking to force the sexy rock superstar Beyonce Knowles into modifying her often provocative dress in advance of an Oct. 25 concert. Beyonce cancelled a show in Malaysia two years ago because of the country's dress code.
Malaysia has been raising the hackles of human rights defenders, particularly with the scheduled whipping of part-time model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno which was ordered by a Kuantan religious court for the offense of drinking beer. Kartika is now awaiting the lash. The same shariah judge more recently also ordered an Indonesian male to be caned for the same offence.
At the same time, however, it's unsure just how much the fundamentalism carries over into the general population. The newspapers have continued to carry stories of late-night revels by urban Malay youth during the Ramadan fasting month, with as many as 200 young people drinking and dancing on tables in sexually revealing clothing at one event, although one observer says that by and large the country's Malay young are largely conservative. He also expects them to vote in great numbers in upcoming elections, with as many as 1 million youthful new voters registered.
These strains are playing themselves out in Negeri Sembilan. In seven of the eight by-elections since the 2008 general election, the party that previously held the seat reclaimed it. However, in Negeri Sembilan UMNO appears likely to shoot itself in the foot by nominating Mohd Isa Abdul Samad, a party division head, to take on the PAS candidate, who has yet to be named. Isa was suspended for three years from UMNO for vote-buying. Former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who has taken to almost daily attacks on UMNO,criticized the decision to nominate Isa, calling attention to the recent loss of a Penang seat because the national coalition candidate had been disbarred. UMNO, Mahathir said, has "not learned from earlier blistering mistakes."
The 14,000-voter district is more than 20 percent ethnic Indian. It will be a test for Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to see if he has had any success in wooing Malaysia's Indians, who make up about 8 percent of the total population, back to the fold. They have been furious over Muslim protests that forced cancellation of the relocation of the 150-year-old Sri Mahamariamman Temple to a site more convenient to them after housing estates had overtaken the onetime rubber plantation in which it had been situated. The obstreperous Muslim protesters paraded a severed cow's head – an insult to Hindus, who venerate cattle -- to the local town hall and dumped it in the protest.
Indians are also turned off by the politics of the Malaysian Indian Congress, the third leg of the Barisan Nasional. The party's leader, S. Samy Vellu, is regarded as out of touch with his constituency and, with the rest of the party leadership, mired in corruption. Najib has endorsed the creation of a new party, Parti Makkal Sakti, and offered to attend the party's Oct. 10 launch -- the day before the by-election -- as guest of honor. The party is an offshoot of the Hindu Rights Action Force, or Hindraf, whose leaders were jailed last year under the Internal Security Act after anti-government rallies that turned violent. Najib has also attended ceremonies in the magnificent Batu Cave just north of Kuala Lumpur which houses a Hindu temple.
The overtures to the new party appear to be part of an desperate attempt on the part of UMNO to search out new component ethnic parties to prop up the flailing Barisan Nasional, the national coalition that has ruled Malaysia since its inception. The collapse of the MIC was accompanied by the collapse of the once-powerful Malaysian Chinese Association as well, as well as smaller parties like the mostly Chinese Gerakan and the PPP
In particular, the MCA finds itself in the middle of what one observer described to Asia Sentinel as "a circus." Its leaders are beset with one of the biggest scandals in the country's scandal-scarred history, with cost overruns for the Port Klang infrastructure project zooming out of sight. The port development was awarded as a turnkey project without competitive bid to well-connected political cronies of both UMNO and the MCA. Project outlays, originally projected at RM1.95 billion, ballooned to RM3.52 billion, with interest accounting for another RM3.9 billion by 2012. The parties to the contract have fallen on each other, describing illicit payments and filing lawsuits. The squabble appears set to wreck what is left of the MCA, with Chua Soi Lek and Ong Tee Keat battling each other for the leadership although both have been tainted by allegations of corruption. That means the Chinese are largely fleeing the Barisan for other parties.
The question is whether the Pakatan Rakyat coalition headed by Anwar Ibrahim is going to reap the whirlwind. PAS has come to dominate the political discourse in a way unthought of prior to the opposition coalition's founding. Besides PAS, the coalition includes the Chinese chauvinist Democratic Action Party as well as Anwar's own Parti Keadilan Rakyat, made up mostly of young urban Malays. Given the ethnic and religious strains, keeping the cialition together has been a demanding job.
"The Chinese thought that if they split the Malays they could win and dominate. But in my estimation, they will be faced with a weak UMNO, an increasingly strong PAS, and a weak Keadilan," a source said. "The Chinese will vote DAP, meaning it will be a 100 percent Malay government with the Chinese on the outside, given the decimation of the MIC and the MCA."
Asia Sentinel.com
"UMNO may lose the seat and start the demise of the party," said a disillusioned party stalwart, although other observers point out that the ruling national coalition has a built-in edge from military and police voters.
The seat came open in the state of Negeri Sembilan with the sudden death of UMNO state lawmaker Azman Mohd Noor from blood poisoning in early September. Although it is a seat in a relatively obscure state legislature, if PAS takes it in the Oct. 11 by-election in what had been an UMNO stronghold, observers in Kuala Lumpur say, it will be a convincing demonstration that the fundamentalist Islamic party is breaking out of its rural stronghold on the eastern side of the country and that its power is growing.
UMNO is banking on the hope that of the 14,000 voters in the constituency, 5,700 are absentee postal voters, most of them soldiers and policemen, whose vote usually goes to the Barisan Nasional. The district is about 60 mi. south of the Kuala Lumpur conurbation.
The election comes at a time when Malaysia is suffering from a variety of economic, ethnic, religious and cultural strains that are being exacerbated by political maneuvering between the opposition Pakatan Rakyat coalition and the ruling Barisan Nasional. Annual gross domestic product fell a stunning 6.2 percent in the first quarter of 2009 as the world financial crisis disrupted Malaysia's export-oriented economy. GDP continued to fall by 3.9 percent in the second quarter, killing job growth despite a massive fiscal stimulus package and accommodative fiscal policy from Bank Negara, the country's central bank.
"They say it's turning around, but a lot of people are losing their jobs, this (Eid Ul Fitri, the end of the fasting month) people are not spending, many companies are opting for early retirement for their workers," said a Kuala Lumpur-based lawyer. "Hopefully (the fiscal package) does kick in soon, but I doubt it on the ground. It is going to hurt."
As part of that fiscal stimulus, development spending is expected to hit RM55 billion (US$15.8 billion) for all of 2009 and rise to RM58 billion for 2010. However, construction spending is a double-edged sword. Malaysia's construction companies are closely aligned to UMNO and increasingly jaded voters are concerned that the spoils will go to fat-cat cronies of the politicians.
Given these problems, PAS has emerged as a political powerhouse in urban areas as ethnic Malays have turned away from the scandal-ridden UMNO, attracted by PAS's stated clean-government aims despite its strict fundamentalist policies. The party has been feeling its oats around Kuala Lumpur, seeking to ban beer sales in Malay areas and, most recently, pushing authorities to seeking to force the sexy rock superstar Beyonce Knowles into modifying her often provocative dress in advance of an Oct. 25 concert. Beyonce cancelled a show in Malaysia two years ago because of the country's dress code.
Malaysia has been raising the hackles of human rights defenders, particularly with the scheduled whipping of part-time model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno which was ordered by a Kuantan religious court for the offense of drinking beer. Kartika is now awaiting the lash. The same shariah judge more recently also ordered an Indonesian male to be caned for the same offence.
At the same time, however, it's unsure just how much the fundamentalism carries over into the general population. The newspapers have continued to carry stories of late-night revels by urban Malay youth during the Ramadan fasting month, with as many as 200 young people drinking and dancing on tables in sexually revealing clothing at one event, although one observer says that by and large the country's Malay young are largely conservative. He also expects them to vote in great numbers in upcoming elections, with as many as 1 million youthful new voters registered.
These strains are playing themselves out in Negeri Sembilan. In seven of the eight by-elections since the 2008 general election, the party that previously held the seat reclaimed it. However, in Negeri Sembilan UMNO appears likely to shoot itself in the foot by nominating Mohd Isa Abdul Samad, a party division head, to take on the PAS candidate, who has yet to be named. Isa was suspended for three years from UMNO for vote-buying. Former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who has taken to almost daily attacks on UMNO,criticized the decision to nominate Isa, calling attention to the recent loss of a Penang seat because the national coalition candidate had been disbarred. UMNO, Mahathir said, has "not learned from earlier blistering mistakes."
The 14,000-voter district is more than 20 percent ethnic Indian. It will be a test for Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to see if he has had any success in wooing Malaysia's Indians, who make up about 8 percent of the total population, back to the fold. They have been furious over Muslim protests that forced cancellation of the relocation of the 150-year-old Sri Mahamariamman Temple to a site more convenient to them after housing estates had overtaken the onetime rubber plantation in which it had been situated. The obstreperous Muslim protesters paraded a severed cow's head – an insult to Hindus, who venerate cattle -- to the local town hall and dumped it in the protest.
Indians are also turned off by the politics of the Malaysian Indian Congress, the third leg of the Barisan Nasional. The party's leader, S. Samy Vellu, is regarded as out of touch with his constituency and, with the rest of the party leadership, mired in corruption. Najib has endorsed the creation of a new party, Parti Makkal Sakti, and offered to attend the party's Oct. 10 launch -- the day before the by-election -- as guest of honor. The party is an offshoot of the Hindu Rights Action Force, or Hindraf, whose leaders were jailed last year under the Internal Security Act after anti-government rallies that turned violent. Najib has also attended ceremonies in the magnificent Batu Cave just north of Kuala Lumpur which houses a Hindu temple.
The overtures to the new party appear to be part of an desperate attempt on the part of UMNO to search out new component ethnic parties to prop up the flailing Barisan Nasional, the national coalition that has ruled Malaysia since its inception. The collapse of the MIC was accompanied by the collapse of the once-powerful Malaysian Chinese Association as well, as well as smaller parties like the mostly Chinese Gerakan and the PPP
In particular, the MCA finds itself in the middle of what one observer described to Asia Sentinel as "a circus." Its leaders are beset with one of the biggest scandals in the country's scandal-scarred history, with cost overruns for the Port Klang infrastructure project zooming out of sight. The port development was awarded as a turnkey project without competitive bid to well-connected political cronies of both UMNO and the MCA. Project outlays, originally projected at RM1.95 billion, ballooned to RM3.52 billion, with interest accounting for another RM3.9 billion by 2012. The parties to the contract have fallen on each other, describing illicit payments and filing lawsuits. The squabble appears set to wreck what is left of the MCA, with Chua Soi Lek and Ong Tee Keat battling each other for the leadership although both have been tainted by allegations of corruption. That means the Chinese are largely fleeing the Barisan for other parties.
The question is whether the Pakatan Rakyat coalition headed by Anwar Ibrahim is going to reap the whirlwind. PAS has come to dominate the political discourse in a way unthought of prior to the opposition coalition's founding. Besides PAS, the coalition includes the Chinese chauvinist Democratic Action Party as well as Anwar's own Parti Keadilan Rakyat, made up mostly of young urban Malays. Given the ethnic and religious strains, keeping the cialition together has been a demanding job.
"The Chinese thought that if they split the Malays they could win and dominate. But in my estimation, they will be faced with a weak UMNO, an increasingly strong PAS, and a weak Keadilan," a source said. "The Chinese will vote DAP, meaning it will be a 100 percent Malay government with the Chinese on the outside, given the decimation of the MIC and the MCA."
Asia Sentinel.com
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Yet another by-election roils the country's ethnic divisions
The sudden death of a state lawmaker in the Malaysian state of Negeri Sembilan last week appears likely to set the stage for the first real test of the opposition Pakatan Rakyat's political power since March 2008 general elections, at least partly because of rising ethnic Indian irritation over treatment by the Muslim majority in the country .
In seven of eight previous by-elections since the 2008 general election, the party that previously held the seat reclaimed it. However, the death last Thursday of Azman Mohd Noor, an UMNO lawmaker representing the Barisan Nasional, or national ruling coalition, appears to set up the real possibility that a seat could go to the opposition, analysts say.
Although it is a rural seat in a relatively obscure state legislature, the by-election, whose date has not yet been set, plays into a variety of disturbing national trends in the country, including rising ethnic Malay beliefs that their racial prerogatives are being usurped by other races and questions over the rising political power of the fundamentalist Parti Islam se-Malaysia, or PAS.
The 14,000-voter district is more than 20 percent ethnic Indian. Malaysia's Indians, who make up about 8 percent of the total population, are furious over Muslim protests that forced cancellation of the relocation of the 150-year-old Sri Mahamariamman Temple to a site more convenient to them after housing estates had overtaken the onetime rubber plantation in which it had been situated. The obstreperous Muslim protesters paraded a severed cow's head – an insult to Hindus, who venerate cattle -- to the local town hall and dumped it in the protest.
Speaking of the violent tone of the anti-temple potests, Mustafa K. Anuar, assistant secretary for the reform organization Aliran, said that "Malaysians of all ethnic and religious backgrounds certainly have no reasons to be overjoyed with the Merdeka celebration, especially when the authorities were warned by these unthinking rebel-rousers of violent, if not bloody, 'retribution' if the demands of the protesters were not hneeded and met. It is of paramount importance to remind ourselves that better ethnic and religious understanding and relations can only come about through mutual respect and tolerance and dialogue – never by losing our heads."
The virulence has put paid to months of attempts by Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to woo back ethnic Indian voters to the Barisan National. Najib has been photographed making chapatis with his wife and ostentatiously visited the magnificent Batu Cave, which houses an ancient Hindu temple just north of Kuala Lumpur, during recent Hindu holidays.
Tensions between Chinese and Malays backing the United Malays National Organization, the dominant party in the Barisan Nasional ruling coalition, have been rising for months. But tensions have also been growing between Indians and Malays ever since authorities cracked down on a rally by the Hindu Relief Action Force, or HINDRAF, in 2007 and threw the rally's leaders in jail under the country's stiff Internal Security Act, which allows for indefinite detention without trial. Najib freed the activist pressure group's leaders and had been seen to be making progress in wooing back the Indian community.
Although the rural Negeri Sembilan district has always been a Barisan Nasional stronghold, analysts say the seat could go to the Pakatan Rakyat opposition. Although the Barisan retained power in the statehouse in the 2008 election, for the first time ever it lost its two-thirds majority, with its majority dropping to 21 lawmakers to 15 for the opposition in the Negreri Sembilan statehouse.
The Negeri Sembilan seat that came open last week with Azman's death, apparently from blood poisoning, went to UMNO by a majority of 6,430 votes to PAS's 4,097, a relatively healthy plurality of 2,333. About 10 percent of the district, near the coastal town of Port Dickson, are ethnic Chinese. But rising racial tensions across the country are expected to play a role as politicians on both sides use Islam as a bludgeon against the other.
The ruling national coalition has traditionally relied on the ethnic Indian population to vote solidly for continuity. However, rising Malay-Muslim sentiment has coalesced with Indian disillusion with its own Malaysian Indian Congress, the third major component of the Barisan Nasional, which cratered in the 2008 election over disgust with corruption within the party. The MIC has continued to be riven with factionalism as the party's longtime head, S. Samy Velu, has battled reformers.
The loss of a single seat in a relatively unimportant largely rural state shouldn't ordinarily shake Barisan power. But the Barisan has been reeling from a long string of defeats and from perceptions of a kind of end-of-era deterioration, with the coalition mired in corruption and stultified in paralysis. Its only win among the previous by-elections was for a Sarawak seat with an overwhelming Barisan plurality.*
Najib has acted decisively to attempt to turn around minority sentiment, nullifying some elements of the New Economic Policy, an affirmative action program designed to provide economic uplift to Malays, which form a 55 percent majority of the country but who have traditionally played an economic second fiddle to the Chinese. The program, however, has created a rent-seeking class of cronies who have become known as "Umnoputras," a play on bumiputras or sons of the soil. But Najib faces long-standing questions of personal corruption as well.
In addition to the problems with the Chinese and Indians voters, several UMNO divisions in the Negeri Sembilan state are said to be disillusioned with the chief minister, Mohamad Hasan, a non-politician who was appointed by the former prime minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. It remains to be seen whether the lack of enthusiasm for Mohamad will cause UMNO stalwarts to sit on their hands, and particularly whether it will drive Malay voters to the fundamentalist PAS, which will field the opposition candidate.
The opposition Pakatan Rakyat coalition headed by Anwar Ibrahim has plenty of its own problems, with internal contradictions rising between the fundamentalist PAS, the Chinese-dominated Democratic Action Party and the moderate urban ethnic Malay Parti Keadilan Rakyat, Anwar's own party. PAS has begun to feel its oats outside its own rural stronghold in Terengganu, Kelantan and other northeastern states, demanding that ethnic Malays in urban areas surrounding Kuala Lumpur adopt a much more conservative lifestyle. As many as 60 young people were grabbed by religious police on the first night of Puasa, the Malaysian version of Ramadan.
Asia Sentinel
In seven of eight previous by-elections since the 2008 general election, the party that previously held the seat reclaimed it. However, the death last Thursday of Azman Mohd Noor, an UMNO lawmaker representing the Barisan Nasional, or national ruling coalition, appears to set up the real possibility that a seat could go to the opposition, analysts say.
Although it is a rural seat in a relatively obscure state legislature, the by-election, whose date has not yet been set, plays into a variety of disturbing national trends in the country, including rising ethnic Malay beliefs that their racial prerogatives are being usurped by other races and questions over the rising political power of the fundamentalist Parti Islam se-Malaysia, or PAS.
The 14,000-voter district is more than 20 percent ethnic Indian. Malaysia's Indians, who make up about 8 percent of the total population, are furious over Muslim protests that forced cancellation of the relocation of the 150-year-old Sri Mahamariamman Temple to a site more convenient to them after housing estates had overtaken the onetime rubber plantation in which it had been situated. The obstreperous Muslim protesters paraded a severed cow's head – an insult to Hindus, who venerate cattle -- to the local town hall and dumped it in the protest.
Speaking of the violent tone of the anti-temple potests, Mustafa K. Anuar, assistant secretary for the reform organization Aliran, said that "Malaysians of all ethnic and religious backgrounds certainly have no reasons to be overjoyed with the Merdeka celebration, especially when the authorities were warned by these unthinking rebel-rousers of violent, if not bloody, 'retribution' if the demands of the protesters were not hneeded and met. It is of paramount importance to remind ourselves that better ethnic and religious understanding and relations can only come about through mutual respect and tolerance and dialogue – never by losing our heads."
The virulence has put paid to months of attempts by Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to woo back ethnic Indian voters to the Barisan National. Najib has been photographed making chapatis with his wife and ostentatiously visited the magnificent Batu Cave, which houses an ancient Hindu temple just north of Kuala Lumpur, during recent Hindu holidays.
Tensions between Chinese and Malays backing the United Malays National Organization, the dominant party in the Barisan Nasional ruling coalition, have been rising for months. But tensions have also been growing between Indians and Malays ever since authorities cracked down on a rally by the Hindu Relief Action Force, or HINDRAF, in 2007 and threw the rally's leaders in jail under the country's stiff Internal Security Act, which allows for indefinite detention without trial. Najib freed the activist pressure group's leaders and had been seen to be making progress in wooing back the Indian community.
Although the rural Negeri Sembilan district has always been a Barisan Nasional stronghold, analysts say the seat could go to the Pakatan Rakyat opposition. Although the Barisan retained power in the statehouse in the 2008 election, for the first time ever it lost its two-thirds majority, with its majority dropping to 21 lawmakers to 15 for the opposition in the Negreri Sembilan statehouse.
The Negeri Sembilan seat that came open last week with Azman's death, apparently from blood poisoning, went to UMNO by a majority of 6,430 votes to PAS's 4,097, a relatively healthy plurality of 2,333. About 10 percent of the district, near the coastal town of Port Dickson, are ethnic Chinese. But rising racial tensions across the country are expected to play a role as politicians on both sides use Islam as a bludgeon against the other.
The ruling national coalition has traditionally relied on the ethnic Indian population to vote solidly for continuity. However, rising Malay-Muslim sentiment has coalesced with Indian disillusion with its own Malaysian Indian Congress, the third major component of the Barisan Nasional, which cratered in the 2008 election over disgust with corruption within the party. The MIC has continued to be riven with factionalism as the party's longtime head, S. Samy Velu, has battled reformers.
The loss of a single seat in a relatively unimportant largely rural state shouldn't ordinarily shake Barisan power. But the Barisan has been reeling from a long string of defeats and from perceptions of a kind of end-of-era deterioration, with the coalition mired in corruption and stultified in paralysis. Its only win among the previous by-elections was for a Sarawak seat with an overwhelming Barisan plurality.*
Najib has acted decisively to attempt to turn around minority sentiment, nullifying some elements of the New Economic Policy, an affirmative action program designed to provide economic uplift to Malays, which form a 55 percent majority of the country but who have traditionally played an economic second fiddle to the Chinese. The program, however, has created a rent-seeking class of cronies who have become known as "Umnoputras," a play on bumiputras or sons of the soil. But Najib faces long-standing questions of personal corruption as well.
In addition to the problems with the Chinese and Indians voters, several UMNO divisions in the Negeri Sembilan state are said to be disillusioned with the chief minister, Mohamad Hasan, a non-politician who was appointed by the former prime minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. It remains to be seen whether the lack of enthusiasm for Mohamad will cause UMNO stalwarts to sit on their hands, and particularly whether it will drive Malay voters to the fundamentalist PAS, which will field the opposition candidate.
The opposition Pakatan Rakyat coalition headed by Anwar Ibrahim has plenty of its own problems, with internal contradictions rising between the fundamentalist PAS, the Chinese-dominated Democratic Action Party and the moderate urban ethnic Malay Parti Keadilan Rakyat, Anwar's own party. PAS has begun to feel its oats outside its own rural stronghold in Terengganu, Kelantan and other northeastern states, demanding that ethnic Malays in urban areas surrounding Kuala Lumpur adopt a much more conservative lifestyle. As many as 60 young people were grabbed by religious police on the first night of Puasa, the Malaysian version of Ramadan.
*We originally called it an UMNO plurality. We apologize.
Asia Sentinel
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