Segamat.com

Opinion  2010-12-22 19:17
By LIM MUN FAH
Translated by Adeline Lee
From MySinChew

Since Merdeka 1957, there has been at least 10 by-elections in Johor. The older generation has but vague impression of the early by-elections, while the young people are obviously ignorant of them.

In the 1960s and 1970s, most of the people of Johor were still folks simple at heart, unlike now when most are educated and sophisticated.

The early by-elections were not so dramatic and exciting like those nowadays. These were usually a one-sided affair, with the ruling party having the upper-hand, with its candidate sweeping into victory.

Although victory is assured, the ruling party still dished out goodies for the people, and repaired some roads or cleared some rivers, to ensure the people’s support.

Johor remained the strongest fortress of the BN throughout 1980s, with the opposition failing to make any headway. In the late 1990s, there were some political fires raging throughout the country, but in Johor, there were only some small sparse sparks.

During the March 2008 general election, a massive political tsunami overwhelmed the nation and the BN suffered the loss of its precious two-thirds majority in Parliament, and also lost control in five states. But in Johor, the BN fortress stayed strong, remaining as the BN bulwark. The BN bastion was like a deep-rooted ancient tree which refused to budge, and the opposition could not even shake it.

However, there was a by-election in the 1980s, which caused a sensation, and it is worth examining it.

During 1987, there was a leadership struggle during the Umno party elections between two powerful teams – one comprised Tun Dr Mahathir Mahamad and his running mate the late Tun Abdul Ghafar Baba, and the other led by veteran party giant Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and popular independent-minded Tun Musa Hitam.

The Mahathir-Ghafar team, then the incumbent leadership, faced a real serious challenge for the top two party posts from the very credible alternative Razaleigh-Musa combination, popularly known as Team B.

Mahathir was returned as the party president, beating Razaleigh marginally by only 43 votes.

The defeated Team B then filed a lawsuit in the High Court, claiming that there were irregularities in the party elections, with the presence of phantom members and rigging of the elections. The court case led to Umno being declared an unlawful society, forcing Mahathir to register a new party called Umno Baru.

The following year, Johor Bahru MP Datuk Shahrir Abdul Samad, who had supported the Razaleigh-Musa team during the party elections, was dropped from the cabinet. He quit as the MP to force a by-election.

The Johor Bharu parliamentary by-election was held on 1 July 1988, with Shahrir re-contesting the seat as an independent. He won hands down, beating the candidates fielded by the BN-Umno and the Partai Sosialis Rakyat Malaya (PSRM), with a convincing majority of 12,613 votes.

Until today, the Johor Bahru Chinese community still recall that dramatic by-election, because it resulted in the birth of the Southern College, becoming the first tertiary education institution founded by the Chinese civil society and opened the way for the spread of private Chinese tertiary education in the country.

In the impending Tenang state by-election in Johor, Chinese voters account for 38% of the votes, and can be considered as significant and may even be decisive in determining its final results.

Meanwhile the Chinese community in Johor is hoping that there will be some meaningful goodies handed out at Tenang by-election, especially with regards to the permit to restore the Segamat Chinese High School. The problem has been there since 1982, and many in the community are wondering whether they should take advantage of the by-election to bargain for this matter to be resolved.