The absence of renowned academic and rights activist Dr Chandra Muzaffar, who attempted to wrest the Bandar Tun Razak parliamentary seat from Barisan Nasional when he contested on a Keadilan ticket in the 1999 polls, was sorely felt today as the opposition party is fielding a relatively unknown candidate there.

Only an estimated 300 supporters turned up to support Keadilan's Dr Rosli Ibrahim during the nomination this morning, roughly about one-third of the crowd in 1999 when Chandra was named as the candidate, according to a keen observer present at the nomination centre this morning.

Chandra, who lost to BN's Tan Chai Ho only by a majority of 1,224 votes when making his electoral debut, left Keadilan two years following an internal crisis.

However, Rosli, a 41-year-old private medical practitioner is convinced that he would be able to wrest the seat from Tan, who is contesting for the third time in this Malay majority constituency.

"The scenario is much different now. Opposition party members prefer to be silent compared to 1999. I believe that those who supported Keadilan in the previous elections are still with us in addition to the new voters," he told malaysiakini.

Chinese votes important

On his strategy, Rosli said all he needs to do is to penetrate into the Chinese majority area as an increase in their votes would turn the table around.

He added Keadilan has a good chance to win the Chinese votes in Bandar Tun Razak as Tan has failed to fulfill his promise to build more Chinese primary schools there.

"There is no reason for him not to fulfil the promise because he has won the seat for two terms and also given a cabinet post," Rosli said, adding that Bandar Tun Razak needs at least two more Chinese schools urgently.

Tan is currently the deputy minister for Energy, Communications and Multimedia.

Rosli, a Keadilan supreme council member, also vowed to fight for thousands of Kuala Lumpur City Hall's flat dwellers to enable them to become owners of the units they have been renting for years.

"Tan has practically done nothing to enable them to own the units, so they continue to pay rent," he said.

Meanwhile, Tan pledged to continue bringing in development to Bandar Tun Razak, a familiar tune he used in previous elections but which had worked for him.

He warned that further development in Bandar Tun Razak would not be possible if the constituency is represented by the opposition.