TELUK INTAN, May 18 — Fielding Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud in the Teluk Intan by-election represents a moral victory for DAP in its fight against race-based politics even if the party loses the vote, according to DAP’s publicity chief Tony Pua

The DAP Teluk Intan campaign director acknowledged that fielding a Malay candidate in a Chinese majority constituency at a time when the controversy over the hudud continues to rage is a risky move that could backfire.

“It’s an attempt, a game-changing attempt fraught with risk, but something that must be taken to pursue our ideals of a Malaysian Malaysia,” Pua said in an interview with The Malay Mail Online.

“If we were to lose the election, it’s a battle lost for a war to be won.”

The 26-year-old Dyana Sofya will go against Barisan Nasional’s (BN) Datuk Mah Siew Keong, the president of Gerakan who is twice her age, in the May 31 by-election.

Mah was Teluk Intan MP for two terms before he lost to the DAP in the 2008 and 2013 general elections, when the ruling BN coalition lost its  customary two-thirds parliamentary majority.

Pua said Dyana Sofya — who is political secretary to DAP veteran Lim Kit Siang — represented the future generation and was the face of a moderate Malaysia.

“She represents the ideal example of someone who looks beyond her race and subscribes to the Malaysian Malaysia,” he said.

Even if Chinese voters might not share the DAP’s progressive philosophy, Pua insisted that the party had to start somewhere.

“If we forever think that voters are close-minded and unwilling to accept change, then we will never be able to initiate change,” said the Petaling Jaya Utara MP.

“Even if we win by 200 votes, it’ll give a chance for a Malay to serve the Chinese constituents and for them to see it’s not the race that matters. It’s the ability, it’s the party’s principles, and it’s the willingness to work for justice. So we’re asking for that option,” he added.

The DAP, widely seen as a predominantly Chinese party, has 36 lawmakers in parliament .Of the total only two are Malays — Zairil Khir Johari (Bukit Bendera) and Datuk Ariff Sabri Abdul Aziz, otherwise known as Sakmongkol AK47 (Raub).

Pua also stressed that Dyana Sofya’s stand on hudud would be consistent with many Malay and non-Malay voters.

“She can say that while she subscribes to the ideals of hudud, the constitution of Malaysia, as it stands today, doesn’t permit for it. And the ideal circumstances for the implementation of hudud does not yet arise in Malaysia,” said the senior DAP leader.

DAP remains in conflict with its Pakatan Rakyat (PR) ally, PAS, over the Islamic party’s plans to implement the Islamic penal code in Kelantan.

PAS has rowed back its plans slightly, postponing laying out private members bills on hudud.

Pua, dismissed the importance of the hudud issue to Malay-Muslim voters, saying that according to an internal DAP survey, the voters’ ethnicity and Malay nationalism mattered more to them than religious fundamentalism.

“Malayness is important. So they’re more ‘perkauman’ than ‘agama’,” he said, using the Malay words for race and religion.

The Teluk Intan by-election, which is scheduled on May 31, was triggered after DAP’s Seah Leong Peng recently died from cancer.

In the May 5 general election last year, Seah defeated BN’s Mah with a 7,313-vote majority.