Perikatan Could Take Selangor Negeri With 20pc Of Non Malay Vote Bersatu Man Says

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Senator Datuk Razali Idris said Perikatan Nasional would only need a fifth of the non-Malay vote to win the Negeri Sembilan and Selangor state elections that were among six due this year. — Picture by Hari AnggaraKUALA LUMPUR, April 20 — Perikatan Nasional (PN) would only need a fifth of the non-Malay vote to win the Negeri Sembilan and Selangor state elections that were among six due this year, said Senator Datuk Razali Idris.
The Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Bersatu) information chief told Malay Mail the momentum from last year’s general election left his coalition poised to perform well in the two states as well as Kedah, Kelantan, Penang, and Terengganu.
-ADVERTISEMENT-Penang, Negeri Sembilan, and Selangor were under the administration of the rival Pakatan Harapan coalition while Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu were governed by Bersatu’s PN ally, PAS.
“We only need 20 per cent from the total population of non-Malay voters and we can form a strong majority in both Negeri Sembilan and Selangor.“We also expect that we will do well in Penang,” Razali claimed during his visit to Malay Mail.
While acknowledging PH and especially DAP’s appeal with non-Malay voters, Razali said the Bersatu associate wing and PN component Gerakan already have strategies laid out to try and convert the group.
Razali said the unlikely alliance between DAP and Umno in the national unity government, after decades of enmity, was unlikely to have convinced either party’s core supporters and could be leveraged against PH.
The state elections will be the first major test for the former political rivals that forged their alliance to thwart PN from claiming victory in the 14th general election.
The Bersatu leader also cited the youth vote that went firmly in PN’s direction last year, bucking expectations that lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 would lead to a groundswell of support for PH.
“But we know that this government is trying so hard to block voices or youth on TikTok and other social media that seem to be leaning towards PN,” he said.
According to Razali, PN could concentrate its campaign resources on penetrating the PH states as the coalition was already confident of retaining Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu.
In GE14, PN, particularly PAS, went from a dark horse to a formidable side after taking 49 federal seats in clean sweeps of Kelantan, Terengganu, Perlis, and within one seat of doing so in Kedah.
The coalition’s 74 lawmakers were now in the Opposition bench after rejecting the invitation to join Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s national unity government.
Still, Razali conceded that PN’s chances depended on its ability to get out the vote for the state elections so soon after GE14, saying that low turnouts typically benefit the status quo.
PN would need a minimum turnout of 70 per cent in order to have a chance of pulling off the upsets in the PH states, he said.
“Because we can see that in the previous state elections prior to the general elections, the voters went for either PH or Barisan Nasional as the voter turnout was considerably low,” he added.
In November 2021, the turnout for the Melaka state election — which BN won with a supermajority — was 66 per cent; the Johor state election five months later, which BN also won easily, saw just 55 per cent of registered voters showing up on election day. - malaymail

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