BN has failed to wrest back Selangor despite attempts that saw Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak leading the charge.

It was not a dream when the plan for the "great offensive" was mooted in 2010 and it was not a far-fetched dream, too.

NONE The tide, however, turned against the coalition when candidates were announced followed by the crossover of former menteri besar Muhammad Muhammad Taib ( right ) to PAS.

What went wrong was not hard to see as promises of new and young faces turned out wrong in many instances.

MCA and Gerakan had, in meetings on strategies, declared their honest feelings that it would take a miracle to win a single Chinese-majority state or parliamentary seat.

The " Chinese tsunami " was just too much for them as they had not recovered from the 2008 political tsunami, let alone fight another battle.

Both Chinese-based parties are just not good enough against the more chauvinistic DAP that has caught the community's heart and mind since 2008.

And it has now matured or morphed into a Chinese tsunami, where parties aligned or cooperating with the ruling Umno were sidelined or ignored.

This, despite the BN giving much leeway to aid the Chinese community in every way it can, including recognition of the community colleges qualifications to be on par with the nation’s mainstream education system.

Umno, as the coalition's backbone, was left with Malay-majority seats that, if it had won them all, BN would still achieve the goal of winning back the state.

'Winable candidates' lost its meaning

But on the day the candidates were named, friction began when the list contained recycled and new young unknown faces that even the state's 15 Umno divisions would not want to get friendly with.

Dr Abdul Rahman Ismail and Dr Rozaida Talib are just two of the names state party members had predicted would lose even before filing their nomination papers.

Those who had lost in 2008 were re-listed and the term "winnable candidates" had lost its meaning to the party members, who nevertheless campaigned against the "tide among the Malays", who had rejected those listed.

NONE Selangor Umno, forced to the front following MCA’s and Gerakan’s weak position, has had many candidates to choose from to fill up Malay-majority seats, but ignored the opportunity, and instead fielded those close to state BN deputy election director Mohd Zin Mohamed and Selangor Umno deputy chairperson Noh Omar, both entrusted to recommend candidates to Najib.

Friction then appeared and state Umno was split into several groups that saw campaigning going haywire, not synchronised and without direction.

State Umno members did not boycott the campaign but their commitment was just not 100 percent given the fact they knew they were in the losing race, a race they felt was not truly for the party, but for individuals close to Najib, who have an interest in the coming party election.

Perkasa vice-president Zulkifli Noordin, parachuted in as a BN-friendly independent candidate, also caused Shah Alam Umno division members to sulk in silence as they knew he was no match for shrewd and popular incumbent, PAS central committee member Khalid Samad.

- The Malay Mail