Can Mat Sabu rescue Umno?

September 8, 2011

For many days in July and August this year and until this very day, the many shenanigans of Umno and the Federal government together with the dubious exploits of the Election Commission (EC) have come under intense scrutiny by the public and the respective task force set-up by PAS, DAP and PKR to monitor the electoral rolls.

One after another, mysterious, suspicious and downright doubtful names and identities in the EC have been highlighted by online news portals. By all accounts and purposes, these fake names and false identities in the voter rolls are found out to have been sourced from the National Registration Department (NRD) and this situation certainly vindicates the need for Bersih 2.0.

So far, Umno and BN together with the EC have had to bear the brunt of the Opposition and the public’s outcry over the dirty voter rolls. Even the church raid issue was a diversion from the voter rolls issue. But suddenly out of the blue, or green as PAS’ flag is green in colour, the most unlikely hero has emerged for Umno. He is none other than Mat Sabu, the PAS deputy president.

Mat Sabu’s ceramah in Tasik Gelugor, Penang in regards to the historic event at Bukit Kepong has been seized upon and spun out of context by those in the BN camp and they have continued to whip up the fervour pertaining to this matter. It is a no-brainer that Umno will whip up this issue to the maximum to gain political mileage. They have grabbed Mat Sabu’s ceramah as a lifeline to gain political momentum which so far has eluded them, notwithstanding their recent wins in the last few by-elections.

Umno is now using maximum coverage of the Mat Sabu issue or should it be the Mat Indera issue as a smokescreen to cover-up the suspicious goings-on at the EC. Pakatan Rakyat’s component parties have been busy bringing up the errors in the voter rolls but all these important issues have been blacked out or given small column by the mainstream media.

It is obvious now that Umno intends to bring down PAS before the general election, starting with Mat Sabu. This means that inadvertently it is Mat Sabu who has managed to furnish Umno with an issue to harp on as the Federal government has failed to address the many problems besetting the nation such as the failure of the various economic programmes, rising inflation and skyrocketting prices.

Certainly Mat Sabu will continue to dominate the mainstream media headlines. It is now clear that Umno intends to use Mat Sabu to claw back support from the Malays. But will Mat Sabu succeed in rescuing Umno?