thestar online | 25-Aug-2008 – The silence on the ground among the Malay fence-sitters in the Permatang Pauh by-election has both sides worried about which way the swing votes will go.
DATUK Seri Anwar Ibrahim is once again looking like the average Penang Malay bloke.
Days of campaigning under the sun have turned his skin several shades more tanned and dark sunspots have formed on his cheeks. And the last time he was this slim was when he was in prison.
The campaign toll has also been tough for Datuk Arif Shah Omar. He told people he has shed 5kg since the day he was picked as the Barisan Nasional candidate.
But when he stopped by at a wedding luncheon in the PAS stronghold of Guar Perahu yesterday, he ate so heartily his friend teased him: “You said you lost weight but the rice on your plate looks like a small hill.”
The Permatang Pauh by-election campaign has captured the imagination of the whole country.
Anwar and Arif Shah have said all that they have wanted to say to those voting in this by-election. They know it is now time for the voters to digest the information bombardment of the last 10 days or so.
The question most asked now is whether Anwar will win with a bigger or lesser majority than the 13,398-vote margin secured by Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail in March.
Both sides express optimism in public. But privately, the candidates are rather apprehensive.
The ground has been rather quiet especially among the Malay fence-sitters or the swing group as they are known.
They are estimated to be about 20% of the 41,000 Malay voters; they are not members of any party and their votes swing with the issues and personalities of the day. Their silence is worrying to both sides.
During the March 8 elections, Barisan politicians had also noted an unusually quiet ground in Penang which turned out to be a harbinger of a massive swing to the Pakatan Rakyat.
But the silence among the Malay swing voters in Permatang Pauh is a little harder to read.
The core Malay supporters of Umno, PKR and PAS will accept whatever their respective party leaders tell them and they will vote accordingly.
But Saiful Bukhari Azlan swearing on the Quran inside a mosque has really put this group of politically non-committal group in a quandary.
In the last few days, colour banners showing Saiful seated cross-legged with one hand on the Quran flanked by his father and the imam have gone up in parts of the constituency.
Whoever put them up was aiming for a shock effect because Saiful’s entire oath, including his highly explicit mention of the sex act, was reproduced in bold black print.
“This is a by-election, not a swearing competition,” said PKR Youth chief Shamsul Iskandar.
But a Merdeka Centre survey, which is still being tabulated, suggested that the sodomy allegation against Anwar has had an impact on the older generation and housewives.
Housewives, in particular, had been very loyal to Wan Azizah throughout her husband’s incarceration because they identified with her plight. But because they are not serious readers or Internet-savvy, they also tend to be more susceptible to hearsay and persuasion.
Merdeka Centre director Ibrahim Suffian said that as of yesterday, Anwar’s estimated share of the vote was still much less than 60%.
“His share is somewhere in the high fifties now. If nothing untoward happens in the next few days and if the leading ulama in PAS continues to endorse him, he may be able to match what Wan Azizah got in the elections,” he said.
He said the younger voters clearly favoured Anwar.
“But bread and butter issues are just as important as political issues to those with young families. They are concerned about rising costs, jobs and incomes,” said Ibrahim.
Dr Wan Azizah secured a total of 30,348 votes against Barisan’s 16,950 in the last elections. It was an impressive victory that surpassed her own win in the 1999 polls when emotions were still high over her husband’s sacking.
Umno has 19,000 members in Permatang Pauh of whom 17,000 are registered to vote. Even if some of them do not support their own candidate on polling day, it will not be in big numbers.
But Ibrahim’s reading is that even if all goes well for Anwar, he would be hard-pressed to outdo the majority secured by his wife.
As such, Anwar may well find that his toughest feat tomorrow may not be in beating Arif Shah but his own wife’s record.