General election & Malay-majority constituencies

malaysiakini provided in an article an overview of the general election prospects for the main parties in Peninsula.

The news item by Nash Rahman and Muda Mohd Noor talked of a supposedly united UMNO being assertively confident, comfortable and combat-ready for the election which may be as early as August.

Nash-Muda went as far as to suggest UMNO on its won will garnered the necessary number of seats to maintain its two-thirds majority in parliament.

I have also read another malaysiakini article that suggested the GE may well be held, say, a couple of weeks before the 50th anniversary of our nation’s independence, all designed for a resounding victory and a sweet celebration on 31st August and of course the consolidation of AAB’s by-then unbreachable position as UMNO president - obviously marvellous for the projection of his enhanced power and then-undeniable credentials as supreme party leader into UMNO's future which will ensure the smooth ascension of SIL.

In fact, I recall reading a malaysiakini (or another news portal’s) article which did (unwittingly or otherwise) a positive PR on SIL as a force of, I think the term used was, ‘light’ (as in illumination) - can you believe that?

I believe there was even a spin that the RM9.2 million gained from some 'heavenly manna’ was used to build up a solid network/support for dear old FIL, who was then a wee shaky within his own party. How touching.

Two-thirds majority in parliament on its own? How about the other parties that will (or should be) contesting in the Malay-majority constituencies?

The Nash-Muda article discussed a besieged PAS which would be forced to focus on holding on to its precarious position in Kelantan, to the neglect of its candidates elsewhere. This prediction means that PAS’ uncomfy position and Kelantan-inward looking strategy would leave the doors wide open elsewhere for a currently united, focused and hungry UMNO – unless of course (journalists always have a caveat in case their analyses bombed) UMNO suffers a party top leadership crisis.

Hmmm, I wonder whether PAS will be praying to the Almighty for that to happen?

I have a slight, only slight, mind you, (KT learning about caveats) disagreement with their analysis on PAS, because I recall that in 2004 PAS could have done well in Kedah, if not for a jolly bit of gerrymandering, and I just wonder whether there may be a little discontent among UMNO Kedah in the wake of the sabotage of Dr Mahathir’s attempt to get himself elected as a divisional delegate to the last party general assembly?

So PAS may yet demonstrate a significant showing in Kedah. But yes, I anticipate the counter arguments against KTemoc's 'could have' and 'if'.

However, if the Nash-Muda analysis is well founded, this could spell doom, nay, annihilation for PKR, as UMNO will undoubtedly bring the whole weight of its mighty election machine to bear on the splinter group of 1998.

As the Chinese Penangites would say, charm ch’au tnooi keen or, to remove the grass for good, dig out its entire root – 'root' in this political sense would be PKR's leadership.

Also PKR is, as we know, currently facing a monumental crisis as its members, or more correctly erstwhile members, have abandoned KD (Kapal Defacto) Reformasi by the droves.

And it’s not just ‘those’ Indians or some youth members aligned with out-of-favour Ezam, or even some UMNO sleepers within PKR, but its original No 3 member, with a membership card of No: 003, Abdul Rahman Othman.

I suspect former PKR treasurer Abdul Rahman to be an obviously unhappy and perhaps disgruntled presidential candidate who mysteriously (like Nalla?) ‘had to withdraw’ at the last minute from the party polls, which action automatically made Dr Wan Azizah the party president in an uncontested election.

For more on resignation of Abdul Rahman read Members abandoning PKR ship.

Next, the Chinese-majority constituencies ........

Expect early general election

In Odyssey of Anwar Ibrahim? (2) I remarked on the possibility of the UMNO-led government thwarting Anwar Ibrahim’s political aspiration by announcing the date of the next general election prior to the end of ban on the former deputy PM participating in the general election.

Well, the Executive Director of the Malaysian Institute of Economic Research (MIER), none other than Professor Emeritus Dr Mohamed Ariff Abdul Kareem, was quoted as saying that “the country's present economic position was most stable with all the domestic economic fundamentals showing positive recovery and the government should take advantage of the situation to call for a general election.”

I don’t know whether his assessment has anything to do with the recent spate of government’s good news, for example:

(1) that our trade figures have exceeded the RM1,000,000,000,000 mark,
(2) Rafidah Aziz crowing over FDI figures,
(3) the PM himself claiming a recent (but unidentified, uncited and non-attributable) study showed that Malaysians enjoy a high standard of comfortable and happy family life under his regime,
(4) mainstream media trumpets a rosy economic outlook (but cautioned by the Chinese business sector),
(5) DPM Najib attempting to assure us that the government did not cook up the country’s encouraging economic figures and indicators to boost public confidence, because the World Bank/IMF check them, though in the bumi equity figures, we remember distinctly their duplicity and even naughty fibbing to involve the World Bank as sanctioning their dodgy stats – please see Minister misled Parliament by false claim.

Anyway, before the Opposition rushes out to print their candidate posters and start collecting campaign funds, Rural and Regional Development Minister Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin poo-poo-ed the suggestion that the AAB government would dissolve Parliament to make way for an early general election.

He said there were other pressing matters that needed to be attended to, especially the recent launch of the Ninth Malaysia Plan (9MP), alluded to by many quarters to be funded by a Singapore source to the tune of US$50 billion dollars – for more of the US$50 billion tale, see AAB's zoo - but who's the zookeeper?.

He said: "The Ninth Malaysia Plan had only started last year and the people may be asking about the results of the plan whereas it takes two or three years before the results can be seen. Thus if we have an early general election, those with ulterior motives will make all kinds of assumptions on the plans implemented by the government."

However, Abdul Aziz back-pedalled slightly and said that while he ruled out such a proposal, it did not mean that he was afraid to face the general election.

Well ……..