COMMENT | I can’t help but draw parallels between Indonesia’s Ahok and our Lim Guan Eng. No, it’s not because both are ethnic Chinese.

I’m talking about style of leadership, governance and political challenges.

There are similarities and there are differences.But they are as I ,a Melayu would put it “sama tapi tak serupa”. Same but not really the same.

Ahok, or Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, is governor of Jakarta. Well, he still is, until October when he will relinquish the post after failing to win re-election recently in an election described by The Jakarta Post as the “ dirtiest, most polarising and the most divisive” Jakarta has ever seen.

Since being made governor in 2014, Ahok has moved fast. Some say too fast, to set things right. To clean up Jakarta, to take care of the well-being of the people and improve their lifestyle. No easy feat in a city of over 10 million people of different ethnicities.

To Ahok the task was like a crusade. And even critics and detractors (and there are many) admit he has succeeded. To an extent.

The rivers that run through Jakarta ‘famous’ for their black water are now visibly clean. Even a Malaysian VVIP said so during a chit-chat over tea to which I had the honour of being invited.

Back home, rather in Penang, Lim Guan Eng, too, set his move to right the wrongs of the previous administration that he'd seen. He was also said to be moving too fast, from day one of forming the state government after winning Penang at the 2008 election.

He, too, has succeeded in making Penang a place Malaysia can be proud of. To an extent.

Celebrity Chef Wan admits “Penang is nice and very much cleaner now” after a recent visit to the island. And his discreetly recorded conversation with a Malay taxi driver in which the cabbie praised the “good things for all races” done by the Lim Guan Eng-led government has gone viral.

But some of the state projects Lim wants or has put in place has earned him enemies. So, too, Ahok when he demolished slums and forced the dwellers to “pindah”.

In Jakarta and in Penang, all was done in the name of development.

However, Ahok is seen as too forceful, crude and arrogant. But some of my Indonesian friends said that without such “qualities”, things cannot move in Jakarta .

Lim is also seen like that. Especially now .But some friends in Penang said that the CM “takes his job seriously”. I asked if being CM has changed the man. This was the reply : “In a way, yes. He has become more determined to do the best for Penang and its people.” Detractors will beg to differ of course.

Several Indonesian journalists say Ahok’s tough or “stubborn” stance can be his “weakness” - making statements in a crude way while brushing aside comments and advice from consultants and advisers.

And it is said he only listens to his mother.

I don’t know if Lim, too, brushes aside his advisers and consultants or if he only listens to his much-respected father.

According to Indonesian academic professor Komaruddin Hidayat, Ahok is a worker and a fighter and “he fights everybody including the influential media”.

‘Someone who can criticise but not be criticised’

And many see him as “someone who can criticise but not be criticised”.

The same is said about Lim. Recently he even picked a fight with Chinese newspaper Sin Chew Daily.

A retired journalist who covered Lim for years offered this ‘justification’. Lim, he said, is facing all kinds of attacks from the establishment who want “to kill off” his political career, going on to say “with such pressure, he sometimes does not mince words when responding to issues”.

And he wants Lim to be “forgiven if he is seen to be a bit combative these days, especially with the media hounding him and forcing questions on him - the kind of questions the media would never ask the PM and co”.

Well, yes, but perhaps Lim ought take heed also to what Komaruddin had to say about Ahok, that the Indonesian politician should “never assume that every critic is a hater”.

Ahok has fallen victim to the divisive politics of religion. He was accused of being anti-Islam and what not. His denial and counter-statement sadly didn’t make much headway. Obviously.

Lim and for that matter, his entire party, have often been accused of being anti-Islam and anti-Malay.

So far he has been successful in fending off the onslaught. Partly because the accusations were made by the same circle of people who are coping with ‘credibility’ problems of their own. Maybe, that is.

But expect extra blitz with extra venom as GE14 approaches. Religion will feature prominently in the coming election.

Anyway in Jakarta many journalists are saying, in jest of course, if there’s one cabinet post President Joko Widodo, fondly known as Jokowi, should not give to Ahok when he leaves office in October, it must be the post of foreign affairs minister.

With Ahok’s ‘PR’, they say, Indonesia will soon be at war with many countries. Their laughter still rings in my ears.

Lim won’t have to worry about bearing the brunt of such jokes.

Yes, there are the court cases, but ask his band of supporters and they will tell you their man, unlike Ahok, is not about to leave office .

The haters - well, some of them anyway - agree in silence.

MOHSIN ABDULLAH is a freelancer who writes about this, that and everything else.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.