The Big Read: In Malaysia’s polls, Barisan Nasional faces a test of loyalty versus a yearning for change
(Channel News Asia) – The election result then could boil down to which of these factors emerge as the dominant ones.
Sipping his second cup of coffee at a small coffee shop overlooking paddy fields that stretch as far as the eye can see, paddy farmer Mohd Rosdi Yahaya suddenly switches the conversation from Malaysian politics to lalang grass.
To the 50-year-old who lives in Kampung Dulang Kechil, a small village in the Yan district of Kedah, there is a correlation.
Do you know when the wind blows, the lalang grass will bend in whichever direction the wind is coming from.
“The Malays are now like lalang. The winds of change are coming, and we’re swaying away from Barisan Nasional,” he added, referring to the coalition which has ruled Malaysia since its independence in 1957.
BN has long depended on rural Malay Muslims like Mr Mohd Rosdi as a crucial vote bank in its continuous run as the world’s longest-ruling coalition.
In the 2013 general election, BN lost the popular vote for the first time but retained power by securing 133 out of 222 parliamentary seats because its vote share among the Malay electorate increased to 64 per cent from the 59 per cent in the 2008 polls.
Mr Mohd Rosdi’s comments on Malays – who make up close to 70 per cent of the population – yearning for change are therefore striking.
They also mirror the sentiments of others in the crucial electoral states of Kedah and Johor whom TODAY spoke to, underlining a possible shift in the Malay ground ahead of a hotly contested general election on May 9.
