Will ethnic Indian voters be ‘kingmakers’ in GE14?
(MMO) – Political parties are paying greater attention than ever to the ethnic Indian community, the smallest of the three main races in the country, in the run-up to the 14th general elections.
The Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition has learnt its lesson after losing its parliamentary supermajority in the watershed Election 2008, MIC Youth chief C. Sivarraajh said, and is not taking the minority community which, he says, has roughly 950,000 voters for granted this time around.
“BN realised the importance of Indian votes post-2008,” Sivarraajh told Malay Mail Online in a recent interview.
He emphasised that the recent economic and education development initiatives for Indian Malaysians as announced by BN chairman and Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak signalled the government’s acknowledgement that the community had been much marginalised in the past and desire to redress its policies.
Sivaraajh believes that ethnic Indian voters matter and will “definitely” be able to tilt the game in the next elections in almost 70 parliamentary seats, pointing out that the community forms more than 10 per cent of the electorate in places like Buntong and Sungai Siput in Perak as examples.
MIC, BN’s ethnic Indian component, contested nine federal seats in the last general election of 2013 and double that number of state seats, but only won in four parliamentary and five state seats.
“But for me, Prime Minister Najib is sincere with his efforts to develop Indians in this country, because if he fails under his leadership, it will leave a bad image in coming years,” Sivaraajh added.
