FOCUS Away from all the political discourses that have been dominating the Teluk Intan parliamentary by-election, exists a small indigenous village within the constituency, which attracts the ruling government’s attention whenever an election takes place.

As if to illustrate the varying demographics contained within the constituency of over 70,000 voters, no map or signboards exist to direct anyone intending to go to Kampung Orang Asli Erong, located near the Erong palm oil estate.

To get there, people have to rely on the age old tradition of stopping at every junction to ask for directions from a passerby, shop operator, and on dirt roads with no sign of human movement, probably stop a moving tractor to obtain navigational clues.

This small village is home to121 indigenous people from the Semai tribe, about 80 kilometres, and two hours by road, away from the main Teluk Intan town.

With no navigational aid or satellite maps to get you to the  place, it is difficult to gauge the exact distance one needs to cover to reach this village.

Auxiliary police at security check posts would give an estimated distance, somewhere between 10 to 15 miles from the second check post.

And of this, at least 70 percent of the road is gravel and dirt. The cars of two journalists suffered the fate of flat tyres from the drive into the estate.

Lack of facilities, made isolation easy

There is no petrol station within a vicinity of 60km for these villagers. As a journalist ran out of fuel while trying make it back to the main road, it is the extra stash of petrol kept in unassuming sundry shops that helped the car instead of being stranded on a road minus human activity in the surroundings.

Getting from the main Teluk Intan town to the Perak-Selangor border of Sabak Bernam takes an hour’s drive, way past the constituency.

But here, a small village called Kampung Sungai Semak exists to connect the various estates, which fall within the Perak border and within the constituency, to the main road.

From this village, the Erong village is a further 40 kilometres away, an hour’s drive away from any semblance of commercial activity. The only company is the  endless rows of palm oil trees, and vast open fields.

In this part of the world, there is not even a single banner, poster or mention of Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud, the DAP candidate for the by-election.

Nor is there any banner for Mah Siew Keong, the BN candidate. Instead, the endless rows of BN flags by the side give away the political  party that the residents here pledge their allegiance to.

“There is nothing here (for the residents) to compare with (in terms of political parties),” says Juli Edo, an anthropology and sociology professor in Universiti Malaya, a Erong boy born in this very village in 1959.

The villagers here had built  a “bond” with BN since the days of the Alliance Party (which they fondly call Perikatan).DAP hardly campaigns here, and when some of them do, they do little more than house to house visits.

When high price means nothing

“Everyone here votes for BN, maybe with the exception of one or two who vote for DAP. But the issues DAP brings up do not resonate here.

“GST does not resonate, because as it is- people here pay more m oney for goods compared to town prices, due to the distance. They have come to accept it as a reality, they are used to it,” he said.

“Maybe if they talk about land rights, it might resonate, but they (DAP) don’t want to go there,” he added.

In so many ways, the existence of Erong represents DAP, and Pakatan Rakyat’s biggest Achilles heel in their efforts to win Putrajaya.

Villages like these are blind spots which do not exist in conventional maps, where Pakatan’s message of reforms do not reach the residents, or even when they do- rendered irrelevant to the life and struggles of these villagers.

Ulu Bernam estate buses connect Erong’s empty, barren long roads to other estates. The only other, shorter route to get to the estate is to enter the gigantic United Plantations enclave in Sabak Bernam, and then enter Ulu Bernam, before taking a ferry across Sungai Bernam to access the Perak side of the plantations again.

For this small village, they are happy with the fact that they have a local son who has made it as a professor, that BN has helped them build a small multipurpose hall, and there are  have enough access roads to ensure Erong is accessible by land.

Even the neighbouring Indian estate, some 10 kilometres away, has a small BN operations centre with estate residents donning BN shirts while merrily guiding visitors who normally do not travel in their estate.

The BN vote bank in this part of the world might not necessarily be enough to help them wrestle the seat  held by DAP since 2008, but is an illustration of the coalition establishment of connections in rural areas and villages.