Felda schemes new front line in rivalry for rural Malay vote
A second and third generation in the schemes are now seriously alienated, face numerous social problems and are starting to see the Felda schemes as “prisons” from which they have to escape often into drugs, crimes and migrate to the cities to become ‘mat rempits’.
News Analysis by Baradan Kuppusamy, The Malaysian Insider
The 250 Felda settlements, mostly in Pahang and Johore, is the new battleground for Malay votes between Umno and Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) PAS and PKR.
With over 112,000 settlers in the schemes and their descendents numbering about 600,000, the schemes hold a formidable, mostly Malay vote bank that has until now been treated by Umno as a fixed deposit.
But now PR is actively contesting this vote bank.
The schemes themselves have deviated from their original purpose to empower the poor, landless Malays, evolving instead into a bureaucratic animal feasted upon by politically connected bureaucrats and their political masters.
Felda needs a captive labour supply just like how the colonial masters had used imported Tamil labourers to run their rubber plantations.
The Federal Land Development Authority has for years attracted landless Malays to participate in the schemes by offering basic amenities like low cost housing, a share of the profits and ownership of alienated settlement land.
However, settlers have to pay for these amenities and often at unnecessarily high prices because of bureaucratic hurdles and demands.
A second and third generation in the schemes are now seriously alienated, face numerous social problems and are starting to see the Felda schemes as “prisons” from which they have to escape often into drugs, crimes and migrate to the cities to become ‘mat rempits’.
The battle is for the loyalty of the descendents of the original settlers and newer generation of settlers. At stake is control over dozens of parliamentary constituencies in Pahang and Johore, traditionally held by Umno, which PR now wants to wrest by promising settlers and their descendents a “new deal.”
