BN win forecast by foreign diplomat
Diplomatic evaluations this should never be underestimated.
By Syed Nadzri Syed Harun, FMT
This is what a foreign diplomat told me four days ago: “Our intelligence report indicates a Barisan Nasional win. But Pakatan Rakyat is closing in by the day. Up to last month, it was about 140 seats [out of 222 parliamentary seats] for BN. Then it dropped.
“And when it was announced [last week] that Zulkifli Noordin was to use a BN ticket, the prospects shrunk even more. But still BN will pull through.”
The ambassador shall remain unnamed but that was a loaded observation about BN’s move on controversial independent candidate and Perkasa vice-president Zulkifli Noordin for the Shah Alam parliamentary seat.
There would be some people around the chosen candidate who would want to dismiss the presumptuous comment. They might even get angry.
But I think diplomatic evaluations such as this should never be underestimated. Over the years, I have always taken assessments by foreign missions very seriously because, with their far-reaching feelers and regiments of deep-throats, they can be deadly accurate as the 2008 election had shown.
I must note, however, that the above appraisal came before Perkasa leader Ibrahim Ali, even more abrasive than Zulkifli, had managed to elbow out the anointed BN candidate on nomination day and got his way to contest the Pasir Mas parliamentary seat in a straight fight against PAS’ Nik Mohamad Abduh Nik Abdul Aziz.
As with Zulkifli, the diplomat did not have good feedback about Ibrahim, saying the vote swings related to the two could be crucial or even fatal.
A couple of other diplomats I chatted with last week had similar reservations although they gave a lot of plus points for Malaysia’s business climate and the long list of bantuan (aid) handed out to the rakyat by Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak over the last four years.
But nearly all of them pointed out to the first-time voters and fence-sitters as being the determining force in this round, and that was why the intelligence report cited above, brought in the part about Zulkifli dropping points for BN.
Secret meeting
Despite top Umno leaders coming to his defence as him being a “principled politician”, it was the views he held and expressed which could be deemed counter-productive to BN’s effort to attract the fence-sitters, said the ambassador.
I suspect the intelligence report from the embassy would be further adjusted as a result of Ibrahim’s latest foray in Pasir Mas.
