Perikatan Nasional not only retained the Sungai Bakap seat in the recent by-election but also improved its performance with a larger majority.
Abidin Ismail of Pas gained 14,489 votes, defeating Pakatan Harapan’s Joohari Ariffin, who secured 10,222 votes. The winning margin of 4,267 votes was almost three times more than that of the last election.
The state seat fell vacant with the death of Pas’ Nor Zamri Latiff, who garnered a majority vote of 1,563 against PKR’s Nurhidayah Che Rose in the last state election in this ethnic Malay-majority constituency.
Of the 39,279 registered voters in the Sungai Bakap constituency, about 59% are said to be Malay, 23% ethnic Chinese, 17% ethnic Indian, and 0.7% others.
The polling results say a lot about the political standing of PKR and Umno in the eyes of the Malay community.
Several factors have been attributed to PN’s triumph and Pakatan Harapan-Barisan Nasional’s loss. They include local, national and global issues.
As in other parts of Malaysia, local communities in the constituency are grappling with cost-of-living issues, the impact of subsidy rationalisation and inflation.
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That is why it was ill-advised of Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli to joke about making a ‘surprise’ announcement of a petrol subsidy rationalisation prior to the by-election. Such a surprise would not be pleasant, especially for those finding it difficult to put food on the table.
Such misplaced levity could very well have helped some fence-sitters to decide against voting for PH.
The proposed sale of Malaysian Airports Holding Bhd to Global Infrastructure Partners, which is linked to BlackRock and said to be supportive of the Zionist regime in Israel, might not have gone down well with the Malay community in the area
It is also possible that some Umno voters had cast protest votes against the PH-BN candidate partly because they are uncomfortable with Umno’s collaboration with the DAP in the “unity government”. This would have further eroded Umno’s influence within the Malay community.
Water supply disruptions, traffic congestion and the infestation of flies in the constituency appeared to have played a role in encouraging some voters to cast protest votes, especially if there was a perception of uneven development in the state that stacked the odds against them.
Compared to the Malay voters, the turnout of Chinese voters was considerably low, indicating frustration with the unity government over unfulfilled portions of reforms that could have benefited them and over the targeted fuel subsidy.
It seems that such unhappiness was also prevalent among the Chinese outside of Penang.
At a dinner banquet in Selayang attended by several thousand people, presumably many of them Chinese, a round of applause greeted Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng’s announcement of the Sungai Bakap by-election results.
Similarly, segments of Indian voters are also unhappy over their socioeconomic status and issues such as education.
For Penang Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow, the political shift of the non-Malay voters in the state is cause for concern. They might not necessarily be a “safe deposit”.
This shift came despite the “Madani” (civil and compassionate) government guaranteeing matriculation slots to ethnic minority students who achieve 10 As. Critics, however, questioned whether this guarantee was really a substantive change to matriculation enrolment.
The shift in electoral support also happened despite Health Minister Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad making a pre-election promise to build a new hospital adjacent to the 130-year-old Sungai Bakap Hospital.
The lampooning of Nibong Tebal Pas vice-chairman Abidin Ismail, who was wrongly branded as a candidate who had acquired an International Organization for Standardization (ISO) certificate, apparently cut no ice with many locals.
Perhaps the takeaway from this episode is that the common people should not be taken for granted. – The Malaysian Insight
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