– Liew Chin Tong
The Malaysian Insider/Rocket
Jan 31, 2013
JAN 31 – Johor is the last bastion of Barisan Nasional but the coming general election may prove that the fortress may turn out to be merely a sand castle. If Pakatan Rakyat gets the support of 35 per cent Malay, 80 per cent Chinese and 50 per cent Indian voters in Johor, 20 parliamentary seats will fall like dominoes. Hence, Pakatan may gain the much-needed 112-seat threshold to form the next federal government with just seats from Peninsula Malaysia.
In the two rounds of seat re-delineation exercises in 1994 and 2003, many multi-ethnic mixed seats were created for Barisan Nasional to maximise its multi-ethnic appeal and to make the most out of the opposition’s inability to win across ethnic boundaries.
PAS was made to be seen by the Barisan-controlled media to non-Malays as an anathema to their interests while DAP as a threat to the Malays. Before 2008, PAS supporters rarely vote for DAP and vice versa.
The 2008 general election saw PAS benefiting from outpouring Chinese and Indian support for the “anything but UMNO” call while some urban Malays voted for DAP for the first time in their lives. Many multi-ethnic seats in the states north of Negeri Sembilan on the west coast of the Peninsula fell to the opposition. Continue reading “The dominoes in Johor”