COMMENT A week ago, I had expected and written that Barisan Nasional would win the Sarawak state elections.

There is no doubt about it, as the local state political parties were facing s struggle against all odds in the state elections.

Lacking in manpower and financial resources, and the grassroots support of Sarawakians who can be easily bought like in any other elections in the past, they were Davids against Goliath, without divine intervention in most state seats.

The state elections were an uneven level playing field, which now puts Chief Minister Adenan Satem’s leadership into focus. After nearly two years of a moderate brand of leadership, Adenan has proven to be not what he seeks to project.

In fact, West Malaysians, too, believe that he is losing moral ground to appear as a good leader; and certainly, there will be more brickbats coming his way. His successors, too, will suffer from the backlash of his campaign tactics.

It is time that the political parties or other non-governmental organisations such as Bersih raise the legality of the Sarawakian government deporting opposition politicians and activists from West Malaysia, to the point of even being uncouth towards Adenan’s own counterparts from Penang and Selangor, during the weeks leading to the state elections.

The amiable PKR president writing to Adenan to be allowed into the state during the election campaign period was enough to convince us that Adenan and his party is capable of being the local Umno in Sarawak. I would have thought that Adenan was a gentleman and more amiable to a woman like Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail.

Foreseen and a given

Meanwhile, for Sarawak to win this state elections, and Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak to claim that the urban ground has shifted, is a long foregone conclusion that I wrote more than a week ago.

I am not sure about Sarawakians who are currently working in West Malaysia, but I believe most of them did not even bother to return home for the elections, unless it is the federal election.

In fact, writer and political scientist Bridget Welsh has also made similar observations about the unlevel playing field. In fact, more examples can be expected of the ruling coalition playing dirty politicss in coming elections.

Unless the rakyat and the opposition parties, including the Dr Mahathir Mohamad faction of Umno, stay united as one, the future of this country will be bleak. What we can see from the international news reports is that Malaysia’s reputation as a country is spiralling down fast. Once a roaring tiger, it is now among the top in corruption and crony capitalism.

The 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal is also hitting the nerves of the international community. Investigations have already been initiated in a number of nations, and in Singapore, several bankers have been charged.

What happened in Sarawak will happen to the politics in West Malaysia as well. Amidst more subtle attacks by people who feign to be activists but are quietly aligned to the ruling party, the Pakatan state governments in both Penang and Selangor, for example, may be further weakened, unless of course, the rakyat can discern the falsehoods played by these people.

They will always begin by saying, “I used to support Pakatan, but now, I am peeved off.” Their strategy is to use something that is close to the heart of the people and capitalise on their ignorance.

A good example is the construction of several highways in the state of Selangor. Land acquisition, I am told, is non-negotiable; under the National Land Code (or another related enactment), land can be acquired for development. Once a federal project is on, the state authorities have no power over the provisions under the Land Acquisition Act 1960.

(I will let the lawyers debate over this subject in greater length, as I am only an ordinary citizen with an avid mind to read and understand what is happening to our country).

The people who benefit are the cronies, while ‘activists’ playing to the tune of the big boys will show their patrons, “Look, what we have achieved, that you failed to produce.”

Therefore, as unsuspecting rakyat, watch out for wolves in sheep’s clothing. Based on my observations of the Sarawak elections, there will be more of these around in chat groups and other public and social media to cast doubts on Pakatan Harapan.

Nothing new

I had envisaged Prime Minister Najib immediately seizing the opportunity to show that people are still solidly behind him. This is nothing new.

One “croaking minister”, as I put it, has already said that the opposition has paid a “heavy price” for their anti-Najib campaign. Within the coming week, you can expect more croaking the same tune.

But as an ordinary Malaysian who is following the political development in this country, I say, “What’s new?”

As someone jokingly put it, the buzzword in Sarawak is money and goodies. After each election, Sarawakians are no richer than before. They will have to wait for another five years before they get their water tanks delivered to their longhouses for free.

God willing, in the next two years, some of them have to start negotiating for bigger sums if they want to ‘sell’ their votes. A gentleman sent me a photograph of a woman clad in her traditional costume and holding a stack of RM50 notes saying, “This is what I get for voting BN.”

Jokingly, I told my friend, “People in Sarawak should demand for more, so that in the next election, they can get more.” When the rich know how to exploit the poor natives, the poor should also learn to exploit the rich. Each has to leverage on one another. I scratch your back, you scratch mine.

Therefore, if this time, it is RM200 to buy a vote, in the coming elections, they should demand RM22,000 for every vote; maybe, that would be enough to buy a motorboat so that they can earn a better living.

After all, it is the rakyat’s money that may or may not have been splashed out, assuming that the photograph sent to me was merely the opposition’s efforts to cast doubts on the BN.

My take is that, with so many goodies distributed during the lead-up to each election, and pictures being circulated, even a kindergarten child would be able to discern the truth with little effort.

In a Malaysiakini report, Election Commission (EC) chief Mohd Hashim Abdullah claimed that the turnout for the election was 71 percent, but we are also aware that the last known turnout rate announced officially by the EC was at 4pm on polling day, at 52 percent of the 1,109,795 voters registered (copied word by word from this article).

What does that make it appear to be saying? In my opinion, Mohd Hashim would have us believe that within the last one hour, the number of voters turning up at the polling both suddenly shot up by 19 percent. Bravo, Mohd Hashim!

What happened at the eleventh hour is anyone’s good guess. If you were playing dirty politics, is it not better for Sarawakians not to cast their votes, especially when you doubt their sincerity to vote for you after they have collected the goodies?

Let’s party together tonight, get ourselves drunk first, and then we decide what would be the best explanation for such a phenomenon, shall we? Stories, or should I say, unverified rumours of this nature, have been circulating around for many years are mere rumours?

Brickbats for PKR, DAP and Amanah

There needs to be a united front at the state level especially for Pakatan Harapan parties. Right from now, all three parties should start negotiating the seat allocations for the coming federal elections to avoid a last-minute preparation.

The state parties in both Sabah and Sarawak have to be more organised now. Both PKR’s Baru Bian and DAP’s Chong Chieng Jen should realise that the whole country is watching them play the game as a team. I hope this is a lesson to be learnt.

Instead of allowing the ego to take over, or the Trojan horses to play ‘kayu tiga’ (expect more of this in next general election), both Baru and Chong should remain united and move together.

Infighting happens in any human organisation, but at a time when unity is more important, leaders of the Sarawak parties should learn to be humble and manage their limited resources, and leverage on each other’s strengths, rather than tearing down each other.

Although we were not interested in the six ‘fratricidal fight’ state seats, most of us were disappointed with the three-cornered fights in these state seats. BN, too, had its share of infighting at the eleventh hour, but they have the resources to manoeuvre around; Pakatan does not!

At the same time, Amanah should just lie low in Sarawak, even in the coming elections. One seat lost by Amanah will mean another seat won by BN. For the coming general election, Amanah should focus on the parliamentary seats that the coalition believes they will win.

On one hand, if Amanah merely goes for the seats where PAS is fielding its candidates, this will give Umno the added advantage; on the other, if there is clearly more grassroots support for Amanah than PKR or DAP, then, by all means go for it.

In Sarawak, people tell me that they will not accept “religious extremists”. In short, what they are saying is that Amanah is still not well-understood by most Sarawakians. Why waste the money, time and resources when you know the chances are slim to even make a dent on the opponents’ vote bank?

Does the outcome of the state election not prove my point?

What ordinary rakyat expect

Ordinary rakyat like me expect a united coalition that is capable of taking over Putrajaya. To frustrate the plan, BN knows that they have to put a wedge between the rakyat and Pakatan Harapan.

The BN era has to come to an end, in order to teach arrogant and corrupted leaders that they cannot expect the people to give their support for another 50 years.

With the 1MDB scandal and the Goods and Services Tax (GST), we have reached a stage where we are saying, “Enough is enough.”

Isolating a minority of wolves in sheep’s clothing in our midst, who try to stir up unhappiness against Pakatan state governments, most people are still solidly behind Pakatan Harapan because we want to see a change in our political scene.

It is not that we trust Pakatan Harapan leaders as much as we do not trust BN leaders any longer, but we want to send a strong message to both sides that the rakyat is the third force.

Until Pakatan Harapan can take over Putrajaya for at least two terms, and implement the necessary changes, we (the rakyat) can only dream of being the third force and telling BN leaders who are the bosses in this country.

(If you like my perspectives, please share with your friends not for my ‘fame’ but so that more people will begin to see what I see from observing the way how politicians play their games on stage.)

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.