Selangor Umno: Can it rise from the ashes?
Behind closed doors, some Selangor Umno members are convinced that the current 12 BN seats in the 56-member Selangor Legislative Assembly, which are all represented by Umno, could be reduced to eight if state elections are to be held now.
Zubaidah Abu Bakar, The Rakyat Post
SELANGOR Umno is still at a loss — it is searching for solutions after two consecutive defeats at the national polls.
In short, Umno has not been able to exorcise the ghost of the 2008 polls.
The situation, according to local Umno leaders, is not getting any better for the nationalist party and Barisan Nasional in Selangor.
At the grassroots level, party members are saying that Umno is in fact losing more ground compared with when Pakatan Rakyat first took power from BN six years ago.
Behind closed doors, some Selangor Umno members are convinced that the current 12 BN seats in the 56-member Selangor Legislative Assembly, which are all represented by Umno, could be reduced to eight if state elections are to be held now.
The recent infighting in Pakatan Rakyat over the position of the Selangor Menteri Besar, although having tarnished the image of the ruling electoral pact of Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR, PAS and DAP) and placed it under the scrutiny of the Selangor people and voters, had failed to benefit Umno and BN.
It was on this premise that former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had predicted that Umno are unlikely to take control of Malaysia’s richest state any time soon since the party had not gained anything during Pakatan Rakyat’s political disarray.
“What has happened to Umno? It seems weak and not able to recover to rule the state again.
“Previously, we controlled Selangor and now we have no chance even when others are divided,” he was quoted by national news agency Benama as saying early last month at a function at the Wadi Sofea College in Kota Baru.
Perhaps the mistakes of the past BN government are so unforgivable that even the flaws of the current state government failed to convince voters to return power to Umno/BN at the last general election.
Still, there is no reason to give up so easily without fighting.
Selangor Umno is weak, all due to serious factionalism and infighting among party warlords.
It has become tedious for these leaders to focus their time and energy on party priorities, resulting in the people continuing to seek shelter under Pakatan Rakyat’s umbrella.
It was difficult for Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak to get things working when he was the interim Selangor Umno chief and Umno/BN ended up paying a bigger price, losing even more seats in GE13 compared to the 20 seats it was holding after GE12.
On Saturday, Najib directed Selangor Umno, now under the leadership of Datuk Seri Noh Omar, to ramp up its efforts to recapture the state from Pakatan Rakyat in GE14, due by 2018.
Najib believes his party should capitalise on Pakatan Rakyat’s recent problems, which revealed a lot of weaknesses in the loose Opposition pact.
“I feel so tired. It is such a big embarrassment when BN is mentioned as the Opposition,” he said at the Selangor Umno convention held at Putra World Trade Centre’s Dewan Tun Razak over the weekend.
Ahead of GE13, the Selangor BN war room on the ninth floor of the Selangor Umno building in Shah Alam was probably the most sophisticated after the main war room at the Umno headquarters.
Run by then Selangor BN coordinator Datuk Seri Mohd Zin Mohamed, it tried to address the concerns of young voters, who constituted close to 35% of the Selangor’s 1.9 million electorate.
It is using innovative approaches to win over the state’s 5.5 million population, particularly the young working class who spurned BN.
Pakar, the Selangor BN service centre that attended to complaints, including on elected representatives or waste management, and enquiries on BN programmes became an instant hit among the 5.5 million Selangor residents, receiving enquiries from locals as well as those outside Selangor.
But all these fizzled out before GE13 and the rest, like people say, is history.
Noh, the entire Selangor Umno leadership and machinery, and leaders in the Umno Supreme Council have to start cracking their heads to think of better ways to win back the voters’ confidence, or Umno will face a predictable outcome — a moral-sapping third consecutive general election loss.
This will not be easy since the people of Selangor are likely to give their new Menteri Besar, Mohamed Azmin Ali, a chance to prove his leadership capabilities, especially in managing the economy.
A survey conducted by Universiti Malaya’s Centre for Democracy and Election (UMcedel), after Azmin became Menteri Besar, showed that Pakatan Rakyat’s support in Selangor had rebounded to 43% after taking a beating in May, largely due to infighting in the Opposition pact.
The survey also found support for BN dropped by 5 percentage points from 25% in an earlier survey in May.
Survey findings are not conclusive, but the UMcedel’s surveys can be an indication that despite the Pakatan Rakyat crisis, the majority of the people of Selangor are still with the coalition and that they are far from convinced that Umno/BN can be a better alternative government.
