Written by: Dr. John Brian Anthony
In THE STAR today it is reported that “The Sarawak State Legislative Assembly could be dissolved by the middle of this month to pave the way for the 10th state elections – this is the latest speculation making its rounds here and in Kuala Lumpur”.
Chief Minister Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud has continued to keep everyone guessing on the date and admitted that he now has got “inspiration” on the date which he keeps close to his old heart.
Full Term
The full term of the current DUN Assembly is July, 2011. Taib may even choose to use the current assembly until the full term. Why?
It becomes very obvious that Najib is worried about Sarawak BN State Election performance. Najib has traveled more often into the interior of Sarawak compared with Taib. Taib being old prefer to visit main town only but still insist on holding to power. The Federal Ministers has been quite active in visiting Sarawak to make sure that Sarawak remain the “fixed deposit” for BN.
Pakatan Rakyat Sarawak is working very hard to change that “fixed deposit” status of Sarawak and it has made in road in its effort to deny Sarawak that embarrassing tag.
Why is Taib holding to power despite wide-spread unhappiness with his leadership?
That is a common question posed to me and I don’t pretend to know. 30 years in an office is a long long time. It is an office without promotion except it give the holder of the office power to make himself, family members and cronies rich. Thus corruption and abuse of power is rampant in Sarawak. So much of Sarawak money is lost and diverted into politician personal pocket. Even the lowliest of political position benefit from the abuse of power system. The biggest and riches prizes are reserved for elites, which include the giving away of NCR land that has been taken by the government from the natives through cheating mechanism.
This rich people keep Taib in his position. Taib will have to continue to give this people who supported his “corrupt regime” and this is hurting the ordinary people in Sarawak.
Taib cannot step down from his position because of his CRIME – of taking away the money and resources of Sarawak. Should Taib step dow, they is no saying that Taib will not land in jail for his wrong doing. Can Taib accept that his final life would be spent in a jail cell? So much for his current wealth and that is why Taib would rather die in office rather then giving up his position as Chief Minister.
Many other State Ministers would be in the same position – whereby they can never give up their position because if they do, the long hand of the law will reach them and put them in jail for their corruption crime against the State of Sarawak.
The coming State Election
To my mind, both the BN and PR is now fully ready for the election. The party machinery of both BN and PR has been on the ground for sometime already. There maybe some more lobbying of candidature by some political leaders but on the whole the majority of candidates and seats may have been decided.
New scenario and strategies
The young voters would make a big impact in the coming election. This will threaten BN usual strategy of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. The young vote will be focused on justice, fairness, transparency and income. The old voters may still hold on to “MRP and money for voting” but this by now would have been eroded as the PR workers has been chipping on this BN advantage. People want more tangible and long term progress rather then short term first aid assistance through project kilat.
Strategies
BN strategy has always been ” bottom line we can deliver our promises and we have the track record”. BN has not delivered many of their promises – the Batang Ai By-election would not be easily forgotten by the voters in Sarawak.
In another strategy, “you scratch my back and I yours’ back-fired in Sibu by-election.
Taib is still using the old strategy of frightening the Chinese by saying that Chinese will lose more by not being well represented in the BN Government. The evidence is different. It does not show positive result even when he Chinese is well represented in BN government.
BN Strategy for Dayak
Put the Dayak community leaders in one corner and threaten them or even blackmail them to be loyal otherwise they will lose their tuai rumah position or Penghuluship or even promise them position if they are loyal. The promises to Dayak community leaders and voters are very low quality. Often food, drinks songs and dance will buy their loyalty. This is the part where the BN Dayak candidate will spend most of their money to keep the Dayak happy with full belly.
This has resulted in the Dayak voters being easily misled by BN and given a lot of empty promises. If the Dayak can change themselve first, then this strategy will not work. It is the hope of dayakBaru that the alternative news and articles, CDs and Radio free Sarawak can change the situation. The DayakBaru followers and bloggers all iaredesign to break up the BN control over the mind of Dayak voters through “anang Ngelaban perintah” and “mina BN aja ulih meri pemansang” strategy.
BN also use the strategy of the country could only be stable when you vote BN. Meaning Opposition will create chaos if they are voted in to be the Government. There is no truth in this strategy but it has shown to work. BN will add spice to the strategy by saying that “the opposition can’t even put their house on order then how do you expect that they can led the government of Sarawak?”.
Pakatan Rakyat strategies
Opposition usually talk about denying the BN its 2/3 majority. They will explain the importance of denying the government the 2/3 majority and promised to be a strong opposition. This strategy has now change to z”we want to form the new government of Sarawak”.This is a daunting task but doable if certain elements and factors are done properly. Immediately the need for sufficient election funds would come as a priority. I will not dwell in the pros and con of that. I am on the opinion that Opposition must have enough money to get their voters to the polling station.The Opposition must ensure that they have enough manpower to ensure that the Government do not cheat at the ballot boxes.
The other very convincing strategy is to tell the people that BN do not walk their talk.That corruption is BN culture and BN leadership way of of life.There is also very little hope that BN can be cleaned from within.
In sarawak, the land issues, the dams, infra-structure, basic amenities like water and electricity, hard core poverty will remain a cornerstone of election issues. Slowly the marginalization of Dayak Adat will get more prominent, it depends on the people that has been selected as PR candidates in the coming action to deliver the message to the voters.
Conclusion
For the first time – IT will play an important role in delivering messages and changing the perception of voters. NGOs also will play a very important role to define what is right and what is wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment