Bangi MP Ong Kian Ming speaks during a press conference in Kuala Lumpur May 3, 2021. — Picture by Firdaus Latif
KUALA LUMPUR, March 10 — Bangi MP Ong Kian Ming today said that Barisan Nasional (BN) has a “misplaced” overconfidence that the coalition will easily win the upcoming Johor state election, based on its win at the Melaka state polls more than three months ago.
In a statement this morning, Ong said that the situation in Johor is very different from that in Melaka, as, during the end of the 14th general election (GE14), Pakatan Harapan (PH) only had a two-seat majority in the 28-seat Melaka state assembly, while in Johor it had a “comfortable” 17-seat majority out of 56 seats.
“Furthermore, the percentage of seats which were won by PH, by more than 55 per cent, was much higher in Johor than in Melaka,” said the DAP MP, labelling such seats as “PH strong seats”.
He said that at the end of GE14 there were five out of 28 seats (17.9 per cent) in the Melaka state assembly that were “PH strong seats”, while in Johor there were 21 out of 56 seats (37.5 per cent).
Ong, who was a political scientist before his stint as a politician, also said that many of the seats won by PH in Johor with comfortable majorities had significant non-Malay populations — making it difficult for BN, which relies heavily on Malay votes, to win these “PH strong seats”.
“At the same time, BN has to deal with a new challenge in the Johor state elections which it did not have to face in Melaka — namely the huge increase in the number of voters due to Undi18 and the automatic voter registration,” he said, adding that many of these voters were not aligned to any party.
Ong also claimed that Johor Baru’s economy has suffered from the border closure with Singapore, and that some of the backlash from the poor pandemic management will fall on BN as well as Perikatan Nasional (PN).
Ong then predicted, “with a few big caveats and assumptions’,’ that in the upcoming Johor polls, BN will win 27 seats, PH will win 22 seats, and PN will win one seat, while he labelled the other six seats as “too close to call”.
Of his five caveats, Ong siad his prediction did not take into account strong influence from leaders such as former Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, as well as assumptions such as how voter turnout could be lower in the Johor polls than in GE14.
“Of course, some of the PH seats may end up as PN seats if the Malay swing to the PN is significant enough.
“But, what this means is that the contest is still too close to call and voter turnout will end up determining the final outcome of the Johor state elections.
“Which means that ‘every vote counts’ in the fight to determine the next government of Johor and perhaps the future of Malaysian politics in the next three to 12 months,” he said.
The Johor state election is set to take place this Saturday.