The official residence of the Perak Mentri Besar has been the hub of political activity in the past few weeks.
The lights have been burning through the night in the white, elegant building, with people coming and going at all hours of the day and night.
The new Mentri Besar Datuk Dr Zambry Abdul Kadir is living in his own house while Datuk Seri Nizar Jamaluddin, who insists that he is the Mentri Besar, has decided he will move out of the official residence by the end of the month.
It has also been the “seat of government” for the ousted Pakatan Rakyat, leading local reporters to joke that there are “two governments in Perak and no opposition”.
The residence has also been the venue of several jam-packed events organised by the Pakatan side.
At one such event, a prayer session to seek divine guidance out of the crisis, the elderly imam sobbed as he recited the prayers, tears rolling uncontrollably down his cheeks. It was a stunning sight, and many in the mostly-male audience cried along with him.
It has been an emotional and drama-filled couple of weeks in Perak politics.
The controversial change of government dominated news headlines and events are still unfolding at a pace that is giving politicians and the media sleepless nights.
As for Perakians, they have never been this politicised. Everyone has an opinion about what has happened.
“Go to any coffeeshop and people will be talking politics,” said an Ipoh-based reporter.
Politics will continue to rank high on the agenda of Perak folk with the Bukit Gantang by-election set for April 7.
The air is thick with speculation of more cross-overs to come. The new administration has yet to fill several state exco positions and many see the vacancies as “dangling carrots” to tempt more assemblymen from the Pakatan side.
Players in the same game
Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s I-have-the-numbers-game has backfired and it looks like his nemesis Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak is the one holding the numbers.
And most interesting of all, neither side can claim the moral high ground because they are all players in the same game.
But the Perak coup has been a boost for the Barisan Nasional after months of being taunted with threats of MPs crossing the floor in Parliament.
“This is politics, it’s not illegal. Whoever commands the majority forms the government,” said Bukit Chandan assemblyman Datuk Wan Khairul Anwar.
Some Umno politicians even see the Perak development as a turning point for the party.
“It’s like the crack in the dam. Hopefully, it will lead to a flood,” said Wan Khairul.
But first there is the by-election in Bukit Gantang to deal with.
The Barisan’s edge is that it is going in as the ruling party. Toppling Pakatan has re-energised its rank and file and it will definitely not be taking the contest with a loser’s mentality.
Moreover, Najib who is the new Perak Umno chief will be Umno president by the time the contest starts and that will be an added shot in the arm for the Umno campaign.
On the other hand, the conventional wisdom is that Pakatan will be riding into the campaign on a wave of sympathy even though it was their own people – two from PKR and one from the DAP – who ended their spell in power.
State PAS deputy commissioner Asmuni Awi has described the by-election resulting from the sudden death of incumbent Roslan Shaharum as “God’s way for us to retest our strength.”
The three defectors who paved the way for the Barisan to return to power will definitely not be campaigning.
They are not exactly prime campaign material. Two of them are defending corruption charges in court whereas Jelapang assemblywoman Hee Yit Foong has become the most vilified woman in Perak.
Hee has been in hiding since her defection although a Chinese vernacular newspaper reported that she recently returned briefly to her mother’s house in the early hours of the morning.
The former DAP politician has been bombarded with insults and even threats. Hee, who is lame in the right leg as a result of childhood polio, reportedly received SMS threats from people vowing to lame her other leg.
She has had to bear the brunt of the people’s fury because she was the straw that broke the back of the Pakatan government. Some have said DAP leaders had encouraged the outpouring of condemnation so as to deter other would-be defectors.
“Defections from DAP are not new but she caused the Government to collapse. For that, no one can forgive her,” said DAP national Youth chief Anthony Loke.
In fact, it is difficult to imagine how the three can continue as wakil rakyat given the degree of public opinion against them.
Split Malay opinion
A Merdeka Centre survey showed that the majority of those polled supported having fresh elections, with 33% favouring fresh state polls and another 35% for by-elections in the areas held by the three defectors.
But Malay opinion is split down the middle on whether to have fresh polls or accept the palace role in the issue. A total of 51% of Malays were willing to accept the new Barisan government while 50% approved of the palace role.
In that sense, Pakatan did the right thing in distancing itself from Karpal Singh’s move to take the Sultan of Perak to court. No Malay politician in his right mind would want to be labelled as “penderhaka” or traitor.
Thus, even though the other half of the Malays are quite critical of the palace role, the Pakatan is unlikely to dwell on the palace factor in the by-election campaign.
However, a staunch defence of the royal house will be a key campaign prong for Umno in the by-election.
“The defection issue will be a big thing in our campaign. These people betrayed their voters, everyone can relate to that. We also intend to question the legitimacy of the Mentri Besar and state government,” said PKR information chief Tian Chua.
Chinese anger against Hee is likely to be exploited to the hilt in the campaign and it would be quite a sight to see DAP leaders running down one of their very own.
“People are all fired-up,” said Loke.
The Bukit Gantang parliamentary seat has only 54,894 voters and an ethnic composition of 63% Malays, 27% Chinese and 9% Indians.
It is almost a microcosm of the national populace except that it is very rural and dominated by farmers and fishermen.
The death of the incumbent MP shocked many people but its timing, smack in the middle of the most explosive politics that Perak has seen in a long while, has many in PAS reading it as a divine sign.
The more rational in Pakatan prefer to see it as a perfect storm in the making.
“The way things have fallen into place, how else but to see it as a potential perfect storm,” remarked one DAP politician.
Bukit Gantang and Bukit Selambau in Kedah are happening close on the heels of two other by-elections in Permatang Pauh and Kuala Terengganu which were won by Pakatan – and by decisive margins.
There was even talk of the domino effect then and that Anwar was unstoppable.
The fall of the Pakatan government in Perak has stalled such speculation for a while.
But the Barisan has to win at least one of the next two by-elections if it really means to stop Anwar and the domino effect.
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