Election Season

March 12, 2008

VOTE BN!!!

VOTE BN, PAS, PKR, DAP ....

I have received a few emails concerning the recent election here in Malaysia and I must say I am quite impressed. I am impressed because I didn't think the Malaysian election would make much of a ripple at home. I am impressed that Malaysia's election was able to successfully compete for column space against our own election news. But truthfully, I am impressed that you noticed the news at all. I say that because I have given up paying attention to the news. I should probably keep this to myself but I only passively receive my news these days. I was an avid newspaper reader for years but I have given that up (partly due to the quality here), I never watch the nightly news (partly due to the fuzzy channel and partly due to the quality), and I never use the internet as a news source (I thought the internet was used for email and illegally downloading music and movies). Without the newspaper, channel 7, and the internet my news intake is quite restricted. That obviously does not stop me from spouting my opinion with the utmost conviction.

I was aware enough, however, to know that there was an election here. I'll first give you some background and then some thoughts.

The Malaysian government is modeled after the Westminster Parliamentary system although power resides primarily in the executive branch. The Prime Minister and his cabinet basically run the show. The current Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi or Pak Lah, is from the multi-party coalition known as the Barisan National (BN). They have been in power since independence in 1957. They have always held a 2/3rds majority- basically, they are THE party. The only other party that until recently has had any influence is PAS, the Islamic party that controls some states on the East coast.

That all changed this week. The BN lost a lot of seats (now of 140 the opposition 89 - no more 2/3rds majority) and lost control of 5 states. They did retain a majority however, and Badawi is still the Prime Minister. There are actually quite a lot of interesting things regarding the whys and the whos of the election but I feel I may have bored everyone already so I will stick to some observations.

The government was not required to call an election until 2009 but someone somewhere decided that it was a good idea to call for an early election. There were only about 5 weeks between the time the election was called for and when it actually took place. Can you imagine, only 5 weeks of campaigning rather than 2+ years! I think it is rather refreshing. We were only bombarded with campaigning here for 5 weeks. I can't even imagine what it is like at home, and you still have to deal for another 8 months. Ha!

Another reality of Malaysian politics that I found refreshing was that this is truly a multi-party system. Yes, we are a multi-party system in America, but in actuality we are a 2 party system. There are several parties competing here and as a result of this week's election several of these parties are now viable.

I was also impressed with the fact that the government, who has been ruling with a fairly heavy hand for over 40 years, has let democracy speak. They lost a lot of power and in spite of some of their heavy handed tactics they are respecting democracy and the people's voice and not contesting any votes or repressing any voices. There are countless examples of countries who have an election and when the ruling party loses ground that ruling party decides to squash any attempt to enforce those changes. However, many Malaysians are expressing a 'wait and see' attitude. They are not entirely convinced that BN will cooperate for long nor are they convinced that the opposition will prove competent politicians. They expect to only know the real outcome of their election in a couple more years.

Finally, I was impressed that there have been no lost ballets, no accusations of ballot tampering, voter intimidation, or fraud. There have been NO hanging chads, and NO recount. Yeah Malaysia!

There are some things though that I am not impressed with. The media here is state controlled, which means that all newspapers and television news is controlled by the ruling party. This was very evident. I know I said earlier that I have quit newspapers and television but I had to check in at least once during election time. I did check in and I was stunned. Every article was about how awesome the BN was. If there were articles about other parties it was about how lame they were. 95% of television commercials were pro BN. At least the articles and commercials were funny in a perverse sort of way; "vote BN if you're awesome, if you're a stupid idiot who hates your country and wants to live in fear and poverty then vote for the other guy".

I am also not impressed with all the banners. You can't even walk down the street without a banner smacking you in the face. I'm really upset because I think I know where all these banners will end up - the gutter.

I just realized that this post is very long. Sorry. 3 final thoughts:
The US election gets a lot of coverage here and people are very interested and curious about the outcome. I get asked a lot of questions. People are a bit shocked that the election doesn't actually take place until November. There also seems to be some confusion regarding Hillary/Obama. I have attempted to explain that they are just competing for the democratic nomination but it is easier to just not bother. Finally, I still think I would make an excellent president of the planet.