BN REASSERTS ITSELF
The Madani win was not the only difference between Nenggiri and Sungai Bakap, however. The other key difference was that whereas PH failed to tackle PAS’ strategy of constantly insinuating that non-Malays are not true Malaysian citizens, BN did respond to it, albeit only tactically. Nevertheless, its response was effective.
In this case, BN used its UMNO-led campaign to reassert itself as the force best able to protect Malays and improve their rural livelihoods.
It began its media campaign with the UMNO Veterans’ Club pre-empting PAS’ tactics by telling its own coalition partner, the “Chinese” Democratic Action Party (DAP), to stay out of Nenggiri because the area is almost entirely Malay and Muslim.
UMNO leader Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, who held the federal seat of Gua Musang from 1986 to 2022, reportedly wrote off DAP leaders as “not even proficient in Malay”, speaking to a widely held belief about Chinese Malaysians.
A quick glance at a television screen would disprove the claim in relation to most DAP politicians, but the point of the statement was to signal that UMNO is willing to contain the DAP’s power and Nenggiri voters do not need PAS to do so.
With that signal understood, UMNO later walked back these statements, suggesting the DAP could always help the campaign in other ways, if not on the ground. And help they did, by featuring in BN’s subsequent media cycle around PAS’ use of the term “kafir harbi”.
This term refers to unbelievers who are in a state of war against Muslims, justifying war against them in return. If interpreted literally, this “war” could possibly include killing them (members of the DAP).
Source: CNA
