What women really want to vote for
(fz.com) – There is an emerging class-gender dynamic appearing in voting behaviours of the Malaysian electorate as seen in the recent 13th general election, political analyst Bridget Welsh said.
According to Welsh’s research, there was still a persistent gender gap in voting patterns but what’s becoming more evident are social cleavages that are adding different dynamics to observable gender differences in voting behaviour.
Some social cleavages that Welsh described were class, ethnicity, age, regional variation and marital status.
“You can’t just talk about women as one group. You have to recognise the social cleavages within that. There is a class-gender gap that is emerging in the election results,” Welsh said at a recent forum on the role and participation of women in politics.
Welsh, who lectures political science at the Singapore Management University, said that women voters generally tended to favour the Barisan Nasional.
This was especially true amongst Malay, Indian and East Malaysian women but not Chinese women.
Welsh also observed a narrowing of the gender gap within upper class and middle class Malays but a widening of gender differences within Malays of lower income groups.
Crucially, the class-gender gap is likely a reflection of the election campaign that happened, Welsh said.
The general election campaign saw various cash handouts deployed, the fear factor, the opposition’s inability to reach out to some rural areas and political messaging that did not seem to connect with women voters.
Welsh stressed that women voters made a difference in the final outcome of the recent May 5 general election.
This is because women, who make up slightly over half of the total electorate, tend to have higher turnout rates than male voters.
There are about 6.66 million women who registered to vote, according to Election Commission data. This means that women form 50.23% of the total 13.26 million electorate.
States with the highest proportion of female voters include Kedah, Perlis and Penang.
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