Monday 31 January 2011

Tenang By-Elections - BN win with higher majority but question mark on Chinese support

The people of Tenang has spoken:

BN keeps Tenang with 3,707 majority
(MI) UPDATED @ 12:16:35 AM 31-01-2011 By Adib Zalkapli January 30, 2011


LABIS, Jan 30 — Barisan Nasional’s (BN) retained the Tenang seat today with a 3,707 vote majority, short of the 5,000 majority the ruling coalition had expected from the Umno stronghold.


BN’s Azahar Ibrahim polled 6,699 votes against PAS’s Normala Sudirman, who took 2,992 votes from the 12 polling districts.


A total of 9,833 voters or 67 per cent of the 14,753 electorate turned up to cast their ballots despite the rain. 

Read the rest here.


Congratulations to BN, Tenang is however an UMNO fortress and the likelihood of PAS ever throwing out UMNO is very slim. The majority votes showed that the Malays and Indians are coming back to BN and will likely to continue to the GE13.


I think the MCA needs to buck up if they ever hope to recover from the March 2008 debacle because it looks like the DAP still holds the Chinese votes. The trend which can be seen starting from the Bukit Gantang, Perak by-election will likely continue until the GE13.


The BN will have to relook their strategy now, because if they think that with all the goodies thrown at the Chinese community would be enough to make them return to BN fold then I think they are severely mistaken. Chinese votes cannot be bought that's for sure.


Lets not talk bull about voting for reform, justice and transparency shall we, in Malaysia communal politics still prevail as long as the vernacular schools exist.  I think it is timely now to have the best of the MCA/Gerakan candidates put against the DAP candidates, one on one in the next election. The Chinese must decide who they want to represent them in Malaysian politics, the MCA/Gerakan or the DAP. While the best of UMNO/MIC candidates to go one on one against PAS/PKR candidates. 


The Pakatan loose coalition will for sure put a DAP candidate in Chinese majority area and Malay candidates in Malay dominant areas, the BN has to play the same game. There is no time for camaraderie and generosity in the next election, its all about getting as many votes as possible, the wrong choice of candidate means BN could well loose the Federal Government. UMNO, MCA, MIC and other BN component parties have their work cut out for them, its a matter of survival now.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

There is no short cut. People want politicians who can work and produce results.

It does not matter what race, but bread and butter issues still rule , especially in rural areas.

A GOOD MAN DOES NOTHING.