Malay heartland holds key to Perak

(fz.com) – The party had to fight against the perception sowed, through the Malay mainstream media, in the minds of the Malays that PAS is no longer championing Islam and defending Muslims after joining Pakatan Rakyat.

 

The battle for Perak in the next general election is certain to be a grudge match for the Pakatan Rakyat coalition, which lost the state to the Barisan Nasional just 11 months after it was swept into power in an unexpected electoral outcome in 2008.

 

And the leadership of Perak PAS, which led the short-lived Pakatan state government, believes it has grasped the formula it needs to clinch victory in the next round.

 

The key is to win the Malay votes, as PAS Perak election director Asmuni Alwi revealed in an interview with fz.com in Ipoh recently. If the party can win at least 40% of the Malay support across the board, in rural and urban areas, Pakatan will form the next government.

 

 “If we manage to secure a minimum of 40% (of Malay votes), we can form the government,” Asmuni said.

 

Of the 59 state seats in Perak, 19 seats have more than 70% Malays; 17 seats have 50-70% Malays; and 12 seats have more than 70% Chinese, while the rest of the 11 seats have mixed constituents.

 

Another noteworthy fact is that there were 15 seats won by both coalitions with slim majorities in 2008, where more than 60% of the constituents were Malays.

 

The Chinese voters are seen to have turned their backs on the BN, and there is only a slight improvement in the sentiment of Indians towards BN, so it is the Malays who will decide whether BN or Pakatan will be the new government of Perak, Asmuni said.

 

He pointed out that in the 2008 polls, PAS secured more than 50% of the Malay votes in several seats, namely: Pasir Panjang (63%); Gunong Semaggol (55%) and Titi Serong (52%). The party also won about 49% of the Malay support in Kubu Gajah, which PAS lost by 66 votes.

 

“We are certain that if we win not less than 45% of the Malay votes across the board, we will take more than 10 seats out of the 21 seats we will contest,” he said.

 

However, Asmuni would not disclose which seats he saw the party winning.

 

PAS contested 21 seats in 2008 general election, winning 6 seats and losing 15.

 

“Out of these 15 seats, 10 seats we lost with a slim majority below 1,000 votes, and out of these 10 seats, 5 of them (were lost by) below 500 votes,”Asmuni said.

 

The latest development that PAS had announced was that former Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohd Nizar Jamaluddin would stand in Changkat Jering, which increases to 22 the number of seats contested by the party.

 

Asmuni was confident that PAS would improve on its performance in 2008 as the party had identified “very positively” the numbers of seats it would wrestle back from the BN.

 

“We are certain that the number of seats we would be able to win in the election will increase. In other words, we will contribute effectively to the formation of the next Pakatan Rakyat government. It’s more than six seats,” he predicted.

 

This confidence was based on the way the PAS machinery works, Asmuni said. The party knows exactly how Umno labels voters – supporters or otherwise.

 

“We have made good inroads actually. For example, in Larut, we would say that our performance in the parliamentary seat is getting better, and so too in the other state seats – Selama and Kubu Gajah.

 

We know what sort of labels Umno uses to indicate where their support is strong or weak – white, black, we know for certain,” said Asmuni.