DAP’s lost opportunity
(FMT) – DAP has long faced a perception problem. For all its efforts to reach out to the Malay community, it is still widely regarded as a “Chinese” party, given that most of its members and the public figures representing it are Chinese. Furthermore, voting trends have shown that most of its supporters are Chinese.
For DAP to ascend to a new level as a political party, it needs to change this perception. Unfortunately, it failed to do so in the recent election of its Selangor executive committee. None of the Malay candidates who contested were elected, not even the famous expert in constitutional law, Aziz Bari, who was hailed as a major catch for the party. Aziz had to be appointed to the committee, along with Syefura Othman and Edry Faizal Eddy Yusof, who did not stand for election.
Tony Pua, who was reappointed state chairman despite being beaten by Gobind Singh Deo in terms of number of votes, has claimed that the Malay members were new and thus unknown to the DAP rank and file. The voting was not done along racial lines, or so he says.
Frankly, it is unthinkable that the DAP rank and file do not know who Aziz Bari is, and what it is that he brings to the table in terms of legitimising DAP as a truly Malaysian party.
If it is true that the voting did not occur along racial lines, then DAP ought to be even more disappointed as that would indicate ignorance on the part of the voters.
