Day: April 26, 2010

By Syed Jaymal Zahiid | The Malaysian Insider

APRIL 26 — It was rather anticipated that Barisan Nasional would snatch the Hulu Selangor seat yesterday from right under Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) nose and without giving too much credit to the former, two factors contributed to this somewhat predestined outcome.

First, the notoriously poor and inefficient machinery. The second is the candidate factor itself.

PKR’s Datuk Zaid Ibrahim lost to MIC information chief P. Kamalananthan by a 1,725-vote majority. The former law minister garnered 23,272 votes while his opponent, a public relations practitioner whose qualifications were subject to tactical scrutiny by Zaid and Co, bagged 24,997 votes.

Yes, there were strong intrinsic statistical factors that led to Zaid’s loss as reflected by past voting patterns. After all, the sizeable constituency of 64,500 eligible voters has been opposition-proof up until the unpopular Datuk G. Palanivel, a four-term incumbent, was dethroned in Election 2008.
Continue reading “So why did PKR lose in Hulu Selangor?”

By Shazwan Mustafa Kamal | The Malaysian Insider

KUALA LUMPUR, April 26 — DAP adviser Lim Kit Siang today accused Umno of outsourcing its “extremist demands” to Perkasa after the right-wing Malay group demanded Barisan Nasional (BN) review its aid for the Chinese in Hulu Selangor.

The group had demanded the government reconsider its election pledges to the Chinese in Hulu Selangor because of the community’s poor support for the ruling coalition in yesterday’s by-election.

“It is very clear that Umno has outsourced its extremist demands to Perkasa. The voice of Perkasa represents (the views) of the Umno extremists,” Lim told The Malaysian Insider.

The veteran politician claimed this was a test for Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak on whether his 1 Malaysia concept of unity was actually practised or a mere farce.
Continue reading “Umno outsourcing extremism to Perkasa, says Kit Siang”

weekasiongmp:
RT @NajibRazak: Honoured the ppl of HS have given us their vote. Our work has just begun. focus now is on delivering on what we promised.
04/26/2010 03:39 PM

limkitsiang:
Well if Najib can spend RM77 million 2wangle a Najib-Obama meet, what is RM200 million 2wangle byelection victory though pyrrhic victory
04/26/2010 03:39 PM

limkitsiang:
Pyrrhic victory – a victory with such devastating cost 2victor; carries implication anthr such will ultmtly cause defeat http://bit.ly/X4MMf
04/26/2010 03:44 PM

limkitsiang:
Based on 24,997 BN votes will work out 2RM6,666 per head RT @Maobi72: @limkitsiang Sdr. you can only divide based on voter turn out..
04/26/2010 03:56 PM
Continue reading “Twitter spat on Najib’s HS RM3m pledge to SRJKC Rasa”

by Dr Lim Teck Ghee

Far from being a resounding victory for the BN and a devastating loss for Pakatan Rakyat, the Hulu Selangor election result is another clear indicator that Malaysians do not see a secure future for themselves in a continuation of the BN government.

The BN leadership may be happy about the outcome and the official media may spin about the vote of confidence for Najib’s leadership but the extremely large opposition vote – against all odds – shows that many in Hulu Selangor and throughout the country (as the string of recent by-elections demonstrates) continue to embrace the “reformasi” programme of change for the country.

From the moment, Zaid was nominated to stand in Hulu Selangor, it was always going to be an uphill battle for the Paktan. This was no ordinary opponent that the PR was bringing into the fray. Thus, Zaid was a candidate that the BN had to kill off – whether by hook or by crook.

Zaid had been a Minster brought into the last Badawi cabinet to give the electorate some hope that Umno was capable of implementing a programme of change for the good of the country. He was not the usual leader who had risen to power through the opportunistic use of race and religion, and whose main agenda was aggrandizement of self and family under the guise of “untuk agama dan bangsa”.
Continue reading “BN’s pyrrhic victory in Hulu Selangor”

The 1,725-vote majority victory of the Barisan Nasional in the Hulu Selangor parliamentary by-election yesterday is a pyrrhic victory for the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak – so devastatingly costly both in political and monetary terms that they lay the seeds for the forthcoming defeat of the Barisan Nasional.

The Barisan Nasional has a bill of over RM100 million for its Hulu Selangor by-election campaign – RM60 million for various infrastructure projects and easily more than RM40 million for the Barisan Nasional election campaigners and the many rent-a-crowd outings for the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and other Cabinet Ministers.

After such outpourings of money politics, the 1,725-vote majority is actually more a defeat than a victory for Najib and the Barisan Nasional.

The UMNO target was to win Hulu Selangor with at least 6,000-vote majority and the Umno leadership was so confident of this huge victory that the Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin went public on this Umno objective mid-day during Hulu Selangor polling yesterday.
Continue reading “Would MCA Ministers and Deputy Ministers resign if Najib does not honour his Hulu Selangor by-election promise to issue RM3 million cheque today for building of new Rasa Chinese primary school?”

By M. Bakri Musa

The kerfuffle over the college credentials of Kamalanathan a/l P. Pancanathan, the Barisan candidate in the recent Ulu Selangor by-election, reveals less of the man but more on our fascination with paper qualifications. This obsession with credentialism is an intellectually lazy way to judge someone; you let those papers and certificates do it for you.

Who cares if you have a doctorate from Oxford, for if you cannot speak and read our national language then you have no business to be in Parliament or the state Assembly, where bills are debated and businesses conducted in Malay. You cannot possibly be effective if you are not fluent in that language.

At the same time with Malaysia inextricably linked with the greater world and English being the global language, our legislators and others who presume to lead us should be equally facile in that language. Anything less and they would not be serving us – their clients – honestly and honorably.
Continue reading “Genuine Obsessions With Fake Qualifications”