BN turns down the heat
The Najib administration has justified staying out of the polls by arguing that the Penanti vote is a waste of time and public funds because it was caused by a voluntary resignation from Anwar’s PKR.
By Leslie Lau, The Malaysian Insider
After successive by-election defeats in just over a year, the thinking behind the strategies of the Barisan Nasional (BN) is now gravitating towards the new dictum that you cannot lose if you do not play.
The Malaysian Insider understands that from now on even if BN contests any by-elections, the coverage in some of the mainstream media is expected to be muted.
“BN leaders feel that as long as they don’t make a big deal of elections they will not be swaying to Anwar’s beat,” said a source familiar with BN strategies.
Since March 2008, when BN lost its two-thirds majority in Parliament and saw the rise of an alternative coalition in the form of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s Pakatan Rakyat (PR), the ruling coalition has lost four out of five by-elections.
Weary of more electoral defeats and the effect it will have on the ruling coalition, Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s new administration is skipping the Penanti vote in Penang this week.
The Najib administration has justified staying out of the polls by arguing that the Penanti vote is a waste of time and public funds because it was caused by a voluntary resignation from Anwar’s PKR.
BN leaders are also trying to paint a picture to the public of a government which is focused on managing a flagging economy instead of playing politics.
The Malaysian Insider understands that the local media have been asked to focus on the economy and other non-political stories.
Such a strategy is meant to lower the political temperature with the Najib administration hoping to convince the public that the government’s time is best not distracted by politics.
The new media strategy has already taken effect with newspapers not giving the current Penanti by-election the kind of intense coverage usually associated with such campaigns.
In the last few by-election campaigns, the aggressive coverage portrayed a defensive BN and allowed PR parties to score political points to shore up its own support base.
The Najib administration is particularly concerned with how PR parties have been able to shape public perception even in the early days of him taking power.
His 1 Malaysia has come under heavy attack and appears still-born even though there are now plans to start a campaign to win public support.
The Perak debacle has also dominated public attention with little focus on Najib’s attempts at reforms.
The DAP’s Lim Kit Siang indicated today that PR plans to continue the political pressure and the unrelenting attacks against Najib.
Despite BN’s absence from the campaign, Lim said Najib was “undoubtedly the primary target” in the campaign.
“Previous Prime Ministers also had their respective slogans like Mahathir’s “BCA” slogan of “Clean, Efficient, Trustworthy” government and Abdullah’s “Cemerlang, Gemilang, Terbilang” but Najib had beaten them all in having his slogan shredded and discredited in the shortest time ever – less than two months!”
He cited as examples the Perak power grab, the police crackdown on dissent and especially the manner in which the recent Perak state assembly sitting descended into chaos.
By trying to lower the political temperature, the Najib administration will be hoping to erase such images from the public eye.
