As poll looms, Sungai Besar voters ask: Should I bother?
Disenchanted with the infighting within the opposition ranks yet spurning Barisan Nasional (BN), both residents and registered voters living outside the Selangor parliamentary seat said they either can’t decide who to vote for, or may just skip polling altogether.
“I am just fed up with what has been going on in Pakatan and I am definitely not voting BN, so let’s see how it goes… if I am free, I will go vote, or else I will just stay home,” a pro-DAP Sekinchan resident told Malay Mail Online.
Several others living in Sekinchan and Bagan, areas in the Sungai Besar constituency, expressed similar sentiments about the federal opposition pact now known as Pakatan Harapan and ally-turned-rival PAS.
In a straw poll, four people who spoke to Malay Mail Online on condition of anonymity felt Pakatan should get its act together if it wanted to be taken seriously about government change.
“Now I know what they meant by ubah… it was never about changing the government,” quipped a 62-year-old barber in Sungai Besar.
To him, the PKR-DAP-PAS pact known as Pakatan Rakyat that was later replaced by the Pakatan Harapan partnership comprising PAS’s offshoot Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah) with PKR and DAP, was a simple name change.
A marketing manager who lives outside the constituency said he won’t be returning to vote in the election contested by Amanah, PAS and BN.
“I will definitely not go back this Saturday as it is a waste of time and money to travel the distance. Besides, I don’t think I have a preferred party now that Pakatan is shambles,” said the 35-year-old who asked to be known as Chia.
Chia said he would rather wait for the 14th general elections due just two years away to cast his vote.
“At least if I go back for the next general elections, I get to vote for the state seat as well,” he said.
Amanah candidate Azhar Shukur’s political ally Lim Kit Siang, who is DAP parliamentary leader, said last Tuesday that political apathy could hurt Pakatan Harapan’s chances in the June 18 by-election.
Voter turnout for the 2013 general election was 88 per cent, but Lim said it would be a “miracle” if it could be repeated tomorrow.
Campaigners for all three political parties in the seat—BN, PAS and Amanah—remarked that turnout for their events have been poor.
“It must be because of the fasting month that the campaigning of all parties are slow,” he said, adding that it will be very hard to predict how the turnout on polling day will be.
MCA religious harmony bureau chairman Datuk Seri Ti Lian Ker, who has been on the stump for BN’s candidate Budiman Mohd Zohdi, said the ethnic Chinese who make up about a third of Sungai Besar’s electorate may abstain from voting.
“They are unhappy with the opposition as they previously voted for PAS, but now it is unsure whether they will come out to vote. But if they do, we are guessing the vote will be for BN,” Ti said.
However, Amanah strategy director Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad was optimistic that turnout at the polls would hit at least 70 per cent.
“We got to be realistic and optimistic about this. So our prediction is between 70 and 75 per cent,” he told Malay Mail Online when contacted.
Sungai Besar has 42,836 voters comprising 22,227 Malays, 13,142 Chinese, and 820 Indians with 98 from other races, according to data from the Election Commission.
Most of the residents are fishermen, farmers and plantation workers.
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