KUALA LUMPUR, June 26 — As someone who grew up with little interest in politics, Young Syefura Othman’s rise from obscurity to political stardom was swift and nimble.
In just four years, the 28-year-old Selangor native navigated and mastered unfamiliar territories to earn the trust of DAP’s senior leaders; she pushed herself through party ranks to become its youngest elected representative — the assemblyman of Ketari, a state seat under the Bentong parliamentary seat.
Syefura, or Rara as she is affectionately known, is married to a fellow party member, whom she fell in love with during her stint as the lead co-ordinator for DAP’s humanitarian programme in flood-hit Kelantan.
“My husband was the first volunteer I brought to help in Kelantan,” the soft-spoken former nurse told Malay Mail recently.
“From there on we started working together a lot... he was also the alumni of the School of Democracy, so we met up frequently to discuss issues and politics. it happened then,” she said with a smile, a feature that has made her so appealing to a legion of young starry-eyed Malay boys who swoon over her on social media.
Conventional wisdom has it that problems beckon in a marriage where the wife enjoys more prominence because the husband feels threatened or intimidated.
When Syefura was asked if her political success had in any way affected her marriage, her reply suggested the thought had crossed her mind.
“I understand what you’re saying,” she answered, adding immediately that her husband holds no post in the DAP.
“He’s just a party activist and has no post in the party, but we don’t think of it as a problem. In fact he has been supportive from day one, and gave me so much guidance when I was made a candidate.
“Because we are party colleagues and both of us started as activists, we share so much in common and we can talk just about everything,” she said.
Trial and error
Syefura was part of the party’s project to rejuvenate Malaysian politics by placing faith in young capable leaders. Over half of DAP’s candidates on May 9 were under 40.
The party also has a stringent selection process to ensure quality candidates. For Syefura, she faced her first trial managing volunteers and programmes for the “Impian Kelantan” project that party leaders used to benchmark and evaluate her performance.
“I had no training or experience at all but when Kit Siang said do you want to or can you do this? I said definitely,” she recounted.
Syefura said her early political education was mostly self-taught, a crucial process that helped her understand and overcome the stigma of joining a political party so hated by her own community. Many Malays remain suspicious and view DAP as a Chinese chauvinist party until this day.
But the bold decision paid off. By the second year, Syefura was made the party’s Kajang municipal councillor, again proving her capability to party seniors by going into the job with no experience but getting results. This led to the party renewing her contract for two years.
“I took things step by step and I learned slowly,” she told Malay Mail. “My time as councillor taught me a lot about public administration.”
Syefura won the Ketari seat defeating Barisan Nasional’s (BN) Datuk Lau Hoi Keong and PAS’ Roslan Md Esa with a 3,710 majority, an impressive feat for a debutant pitted in a three-corner fight against more experienced candidates like Lau.
Work begins officially on July 2 for Syefura, the day new members of the Pahang state legislative assembly are to be sworn in. DAP and its Pakatan Harapan allies will continue as Opposition in the state where BN remains in power thanks to its largely loyal Federal Land Development Agency (Felda) constituents.
Pahang is one of the only two states in the peninsula retained by the defeated coalition after the May 9 polls. The other is Perlis.
Sarawak was BN’s until the four component parties which made up the coalition there pulled out on June 12.
‘I am nervous’
Syefura is still upbeat about her new role, pledging to be an effective Opposition leader both in the state assembly and in her constituency which has its own deep-seated problems.
Youth unemployment is high, jobs are scarce even while it faces illegal development, which Syefura and DAP vowed to resolve if she is elected.
Although the party has groomed her well for this role, Syefura cannot help but feel a little uncertain as she goes forward.
However, it is a feeling that is all too familiar by now — the butterflies in her gut — as she starts from scratch to work her way up just as she did as an activist and a former councillor, only this time under greater pressure to perform.
“I am nervous. I will have to work for more than 20,000 people... but I am willing to learn again and I want to work hard.”
