by Carolyn Hong, Apr 5.
For a tiny town in rural Kelantan, Gua Musang has a very large district police station. You can’t miss it. It sits just outside the town, and looks almost like a craft complex with its traditional Malay architecture.
It was my first time in Gua Musang on Friday, a two-hour 150km journey from Kota Baru, and it was to listen to Tengku Razaleigh’s first speech in his campaign to unseat the prime minister.
It was worth the journey. ”Continued”
by Ong Kian Ming, malaysiakini.
analysis A journalist friend of mine recently asked me this intriguing question – ‘Would the opposition have won the 2008 general election if the parliamentary seats were allocated proportionally?’
This question does not seem as ludicrous one may imagine, even if the Barisan Nasional did win 63% of parliamentary seats. The reason is that parliamentary seats in Malaysia do not have the same number of voters. Political scientists define this practice as malapportionment.
Indeed, the discrepancy between the largest and smallest parliamentary seat in Malaysia is huge. The largest seat, Kapar, has 112,000 voters while the smallest, Putrajaya only has 7,000 voters.
There are discrepancies between states as well. Selangor has an average of 71,000 voters in its 22 seats while Pahang has an average of 43,000 voters in its 14 seats. Sabah has an average of 31,000 voters in its 26 and Sarawak, an average of 29,000 voters in its 31 seats.
I won’t go into the mechanics of how seats are allocated between the states and how lines are drawn within them. Rather I want to project the electoral outcomes of the 2008 general election if the parliamentary seats were allocated to the different states in proportion to the number of voters in each state. ”Continued”
by Dean Johns, malaysiakini, Mar 12.
Congratulations to the parties, candidates and supporters of Barisan Rakyat on the results of the 12th general election. The outcome was more exciting and encouraging than even the most optimistic of us could have dared hope for.
election voter 2008 vote ballot boxIt was a stunning moral victory against seemingly impossible odds. And it was only these outrageous odds in Barisan Nasional’s favour - from massive gerrymandering of electorates to its manipulation of the mainstream media - that denied the nation the change of government it sorely needs and has now shown that it dearly desires.
BN may have kept its grip on power for now, but five years of government by a long-ruling regime that knows it needs to reform itself or die, with a resurgent opposition that’s increasingly ready to put it out of its misery, may prove a salutory transitional stage in Malaysia’s political evolution. ”Continued”
by Josh Hong, malaysiakini, Mar 14.
Much of the nation was immersed in euphoria over the unexpected wins by the major opposition parties last weekend, only to taste some bitter fruits of victory now.
Yes, Umno, MCA, MIC and Gerakan fell like a house of cards in many of their parliamentary and state assembly constituencies, but racist politics is still very much alive and kicking. I mean, within the DAP itself.
Initially, I was extremely heartened to note that Islam, or the Islamic state debate, played a very insignificant role in the just concluded general elections, as opposed to the previous two.
I remember Lim Keng Yeik of Gerakan and Ng Yen Yen of MCA, the two chief non-Muslim propagandists of Umno, going around Chinese areas scare-mongering the voters with ‘no pork, no karaoke and no cosmetics’ talks in 1999 and 2004, but those ridiculous words were conspicuously absent this time around. ”Continued”
On The Beat - by Wong Chun Wai.
IF is there is one thing true sportsmen learn from day one is that you shake the hands of your rivals after a game.
You congratulate them, sulk all you want in the changing room and then go back to the training ground to gear yourself up for the next match.
The winner, on the other hand, should not gloat over his win and be unnecessarily arrogant.
And of course, the last thing you want is to have your fans, whether of the winners or losers, to go to the streets to cause mischief.
The politicians in Penang should take a leaf from true sportsmen. Not the sort one watches on the English Premier League, where arrogant footballers abuse the referee and throw tantrums, even when they wear the captain’s armband.
The impression one gets after the protest by Umno leaders at Komtar on Friday is that they are bad losers.
The reality is that the DAP, with the support of PKR and PAS, has formed the Penang state government and DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng is now the Chief Minister. ”Continued”
By Joceline Tan, Sunday Star.
The Prime Minister will have a lot of hard decisions to make in the aftermath of the earthquake that shook up the political landscape.
IT has been more than a week since the elections but Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s voice was still hoarse, as though he was still on the ceramah circuit.
The election campaign has ended but the senior Umno vice-president has not had the chance to take a break. His mobile phone is still jammed with text messages and calls and Umno members have been asking to meet him, all wanting answers for the stunning outcome of the general election.
He has been doing a lot of talking and explaining, hence the condition of his voice.
“There is a lot of anger, confusion and frustration among Umno members. The results were catastrophic, none of us expected it and they are asking what happened, what to do now. They are concerned about the future, the state of the party and the leadership,” he said. ”Continued”
Commentary by Kua Kia Soong, malaysiakini, Mar 14.
(My comments in bold)
The DAP’s squabble over the choice of mentri besar for Perak and deputy mentri besar for Selangor exposes the party’s surprising lack of integrity and professionalism.
If its leaders had these qualities, they would have simply put forward their candidates before the sultan for endorsement, as is required in our democratic system. Instead, the DAP leadership has continued with their tedious PAS-phobia posturing and in so doing, have demeaned our parliamentary democracy by passing the buck to the sultans.
In our democratic system, the Agung and the sultans merely endorse the executive list that is put before them by the ruling coalition. In Perak and Selangor, the DAP has created a serious precedent by passing over this prerogative to the respective sultans and it is all because of their PAS-phobia posturing in Perak and intra-party factionalism in Selangor.
It is a bad precedent and one which the DAP will have to take responsibility.
(I agree. I have doubts the Regent of Perak has any legal authority to require all the reps to sign a pledge of allegiance to the Pas chap. I am even more surprised the reps signed it)
The people of Selangor expect the DAP to make good their commitment to meritocracy and not air their petty intra-party power struggles in public. If the DAP does not have a mechanism to assess the relative merits of their own candidates for deputy MB, how can they shout about the BN’s failure to honour meritocracy? The public knows that Teng Chang Khim has served longest in the Selangor State Assembly as a very capable leader of the opposition and any rookie forced down our throats by the DAP central leadership is not going to change that fact.
(While on paper Teng appears the natural choice, his inability to work closely with the leadership may open a communication gap between the Selangor executive and the party whose ticket he contested under. Women groups would also like to see the first female DMB ever comes from Selangor.)
What is at stake is the credibility of the DAP central leadership. Their recent actions have shown that they are merely paying lip service to integrity and professionalism. They should mend their ways or prepare to face the consequences before long. While we are on the subject of integrity and professionalism, the DAP should try to take a leaf from the disgraced MCA. Despite the MCA’s failings, there were two democratic principles of theirs the DAP should emulate:
(The DAP’s tradition of fielding candidates for federal and state seats is because its membership is small and candidate numbers are limited. That is why the party lets NGO activists contest on its ticket. It is no use putting unknown new faces who are not winning chances. Not many new candidates have the money to contest competitively. Many new candidates this round are now heavily in debt. Many of them also have no grassroot support. Election volunteers would prefer to help a named candidate rather than an unknown. Surely Dr Kua can understand the BN needn’t field MP-SA candidates because it has 14 component parties and no shortage of candidates. Please compare apples with apples.)
Is there an assumption that serving the people in a federal constituency is so free and easy that these representatives can have the time to serve another state constituency? This seems to be a convenient invention of the opposition parties here which is anathema to the principles of people’s democracy.
(Please define ’serve’. Does that mean longkang issues? Are MP-SAs responsible for drains?)
I remember when I was in the Selangor DAP in the 90s and we managed to kick out from the state an MP who not only ran two private practices but still insisted on standing in a state constituency.
Clearly, political office had become a convenient career for these DAP representatives. But I am surprised that instead of progressing and making this principle standard throughout the party, the Selangor DAP has reverted to the old formula.
(I have little pity for DAP Selangor, the most lansi organisation ever. Can you imagine a chap who’s been defeated in every election since the 80s putting up his hand for the DMB post. What a joke!)
After all, haven’t we been told that there are now so many new talents in the DAP? So why do these old DAP leaders need to be so greedy? Is this all so that the people can be served better?
Did not Gerakan’s Dr Koh Tsu Koon choose to run only for a federal seat by giving up his state seat? Why is the opposition backward compared to the BN on this principle?
(Dr Kua is now comparing apples with pears!)
I pause for a reply…
Analysis by Ong Kian Ming, mkini, March 11
As Malaysians go back to work yesterday, the historic results of the 12th general election are beginning to sink in slowly.
Before the results were announced on Saturday, many people were discussing the possibility of this election being similar to the 1986 general elections where the non-Malay vote swung against Barisan Nasional and the DAP had its best performance where it won 24 out of a possible 172 parliamentary seats.
But it is more apt to compare this election to the last time the BN lost the popular vote in Peninsular Malaysia and failed to capture a two-thirds majority in parliament for what was the first and only time in Malaysia’s electoral history, up until now. That was in 1969.
While the Alliance failed to obtain a majority of the popular vote, it still managed to win 67 out of 104 parliamentary seats in Peninsular Malaysia (64.4%), partly aided by the fact that nine parliamentary seats were not contested. ”Continued”
AsiaSentinel.com, March 9.
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi could well lose his job after the country awoke to a radically political landscape Sunday, with the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition having suffered its biggest defeat since independence, losing five state parliaments outright and its two-thirds majority in the national parliament.
The relative drubbing in Saturday’s elections, in which the national coalition’s hold on the 220-member parliament fell from 198 seats to 127, appears likely to restore former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to a significant role in national politics as leader of the opposition.
Mahathir Mohamad, who Abdullah Badawi succeeded in 2002, immediately demanded his ouster,saying he had “destroyed Umno, destroyed the Barisan Nasional, and he has been responsible for this.” ”Continued”
Stay updated with RSS feed
| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| « Apr | ||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | ||||
| 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 |
| 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 |
| 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 |
| 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 |
