Can we have an issues-based GE14?

We are too forgiving of an incompetent coalition that has spent the better part of its second term as the official opposition bickering over non-existent power.

Scott Ng, Free Malaysia Today

Being followers of populist politicians obviously hasn’t worked out very well for us.

You know the general election is around the corner when the government starts handing out goodies. Call it a charm offensive or legal bribery if you will, but ruling governments – and not just in Malaysia – have been handing out voting incentives in the form of projects and allocations since elections were introduced in their countries.

Certainly, this will provoke the usual questions about whether it is morally or legally right to dangle carrots in front of people’s faces in such a manner, but such talk actually distracts from the real point of holding an election.

An election needs to be a referendum on the issues that truly matter, issues that affect our day to day life and that which will affect the lives of our children.

Malaysians are particularly vulnerable to the notion of the cult of personality. Many of us don’t vote with our heads. We follow Anwar Ibrahim, Lim Guan Eng, Najib Razak, et cetera, with little thought of what they represent. This has allowed politicians on both sides of the aisle to maintain large followings without putting forward substantial policy ideas. All one has to do to service this following is to occasionally be controversial, whether by pulling the PR stunts the opposition is known for or by making the macho grandstanding we have come to associate with the Najib regime.