Teluk Intan - a bridge too far for Dyana Sofya

First thing first - congratulations to Mah Siew Keong for his victory and his eventual ministership.

Secondly, I had hopes for using the immortal words of Neil Armstrong to eulogize the expected but unrealized by-election victory by sweetie Dyana, paraphrased as "That's one small step for Dyana and Teluk Intan, one giant leap for Malaysia", but alas it was not to be.

It's a slim victory for Mah with a majority of 238 votes but nonetheless a victory, for winning by one vote is still a sweet victory.

There's no point blaming the Chinese, Malay or Indians or the DAP's outstation supporters who didn't make it back to TI to vote, or even the EC for holding the by-election polls on a Saturday instead of a Sunday. Nor is there any need to analyze the DAP internal dissent over Dyana as a parachuted candidate for the by-election. All these are part and parcel of politics.

Neither is there any value in criticizing or cursing the dirty campaigning by UMNO, where every millimetre of Dyana's private and public life was dug up for dirt (which would be turned into BN campaign gold), though I may just mention some bizarre ones for my own blog record, wakakaka.

Not since Helen of Sparta was abducted or seduced (depending on your leanings, wakakaka) which triggered the angry united Hellenic kingdoms in antiquity into launching a thousand ships to get her back, have Malaysians seen a mightily worried and furious UMNO launched a thousand kitchen sinks at sweetie Dyana Sofya to destroy her personal credibility, reputation and social standing.

Dyana as a young Malay woman breaking away from her expected allegiance to UMNO was a far too dangerous leak in the Heartland dam, one which may lead to a breakaway flood of Malay youths (their allegiance) in the Heartland to the DAP, a party which UMNO wants the Malays to consider and to continue to consider as a demonic Chinese political party.

Then there was a BN person who said it's only natural that Chinese in TI should vote for a Chinese candidate, wakakaka, but now, I don't want anyone to blame Ridhuan Tee, wakakaka.

Of course we have our Ahmad Maslan for comic relief as he continued to f**k up kau kau as in the comical episode of the so-called 150 DAP defectors. It turned out they were present for hampers and other gifts (any Janome sewing machines?), wakakaka, and were forced to wear BN T-shirts.

The comedy ended up with MIC getting riled at being blamed and who then whistle-blew at the remarkable Ahmad Maslan as being the joker responsible for the BN debacle.

Muhyiddin Yassin even exploited the demise and mourning period of Allahyarham HRH Sultan Azlan Shah to attack DAP with a fabricated accusation, one in which DAP responded to by publicly calling Muhyiddin a 'liar', which thus far he hadn't responded to.

But the harm would have already been done to DAP in the Heartland's view of the political party as being disrespectful to Allahyarham HRH. To twist the fabrication knife deeper in the DAP's side, Rayer (wakakaka) was also falsely accused of insulting Allahyarham HRH.

But appalling as such surat-layang-ish campaigning might be by western standards, it has been and will continue to be the typical, and thus to be expected, Malaysian style of political campaigning, either in public or intra party election campaigning.

Years ago while working in a public organization I learnt after an unscrupulous Chinese co-worker sabotaged me in order to be promoted ahead of yours truly, by fabricating vile racist actions on my part, that there could be no defence even against such fabricated accusations.

It's in our national character to believe all the worst in someone accused, and even when those fabrications were proven to be false/fabricated, the listeners (not the fabricators) would bizarrely take up the defence and justifications of the fabrications (perhaps to rationalize they were right in the first place to believe in the lies).

How to defend against such lies? What I did was to ignore them (the lies, liar and those who believed in those lies) and moved on, though of course I was mortally wounded career-wise.

But regardless, I urge the DAP not to falter in their Malay-nization strategy, where in earlier post
The necessary Malay-nization of DAP I had penned:

But what I really fear about the smear campaign against sweetie Dyana is that the DAP may chicken out of putting her as the much touted DAP candidate for the TI by-election, and backtrack into sh*t-scared safety by nominating a Chinese or Indian.

By such a play-safe action, that of a DAP retreating into its self-restricting non-Malay-ness, UMNO would be handed both a moral and a strategic victory as it wants DAP to be and thus to remain a Chinese party.

Thus, notwithstanding the undeniable threat of such a sleaze campaign (we Malaysians love sleaze even if fabricated), the DAP must bite the bullet and nominate sweetie Dyana for the TI by-election, and it must continue doing so with more Malays as its future election candidates for future state and federal parliaments.

DAP to its credit and political courage, and indeed strategic wisdom did not 'chicken' out as evident in its selection of Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud to contest the TI by-election despite some unhappiness within its Perak membership and in the wake of PAS hudud controversy which would have alienated many Chinese in TI. And Dyana did reasonably well despite many odds against her. The result was down to the wire, a mere 238 votes. She can improve on her performance

I like to appeal to the DAP leadership by reiterating that despite this by-election setback, it must continue to maintain its strategy of putting up Malay candidates like sweetie Dyana Sofya as its future election candidates. Memeganglah teguh tujuan parti ini!

News media have describe the TI by-election as probably the toughest election fought between BN (essentially UMNO) and Pakatan. But I see it as a watershed in so many aspects: firstly, DAP put up a Malay candidate while UMNO (let's not mince words that it wasn't UMNO) put up one of those evil Chinese, wakakaka; secondly, to win the Malay candidate had depended on Chinese support while the Chinese candidate on Malay and Indian support, wakakaka.

How more Malaysian could that have been, though in a bizarre politically acrimonious way. 

But in truth, the Heartland is still fairly impenetrable, not just to DAP but also, as had been known, to PAS (local TI branch very unhappy) and PKR. However, it's gratifying to read that there was a slight swing of Malay voters to Dyana, though the Chinese and Indians swung by 10% each to Mah.

The DAP must continue chipping away at the great walls of the Heartland fortress, which UMNO had feared Dyana would do the reverse of the (story of the) little Dutch boy who plugged his teeny weeny finder in the dyke to prevent a flood.

Finally, I wonder whether the Cadbury porcine DNA had anything to do with the TI by-election. Have you heard of subliminal advertising (or propaganda) which is illegal in western countries.

The Dictionary defines the word 'subliminal' as an adjective describing 'a stimulus or mental process below the threshold of sensation or consciousness, or perceived by or affecting someone's mind without their being aware of it.'

Say, I sell fizzy cold drink 'X' and want to influence people to buy it. I get an advertizing company to insert a short video strip of scenes showing how marvellously refreshing it is to drink 'X' in among the tapes of a movie or TV show. The inserted strip of tape extolling the refreshing nature of 'X' would be appropriately short so that its effect is subliminal, or that while the audience won't consciously see it, it will subliminally affects or influence the audience's mind without their being aware of it.

Now, the Cadbury brouhaha wasn't exactly a classical subliminal happening, but I could see it as being a variant of subliminal propaganda, that was, to invoke revulsion and anger among the pious Muslims and to hopefully channel their abhorrence against all things porcine, including the consumers of pigs (specially the already perceived 'Chinese' DAP). 

Far-fetched? No more than Dr Mahathir's postulation that MH370 was remotely commandeered, controlled and flown to a mysterious Lost City of Atlantis in the southern Indian Ocean.

After all, didn't they day 'all is fair in love and war', and politics in Malaysia is war!