KUALA LUMPUR, March 22 — Barisan Nasional (BN) as a coalition seems to have recovered somewhat from its dismal loss at the general election nearly a year ago.
Its anchor party Umno is picking up the pieces and has started moving on under the leadership of Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan.
The acting president who is also known as Tok Mat has managed to keep the party from splintering further and its BN partners, Chinese-based MCA and Indian-based MIC, remaining under the same roof.
Tok Mat who has held the Rantau state seat since 2004 is once again the BN assemblyman candidate in the April 13 by-election.
His mission to retain the seat looks easy as the groundwork has been laid and he must have ensured maintenance during his three terms as Negri Sembilan mentri besar before BN lost the state last year.
In fact, it might be easier now as the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government has yet to deliver its electoral pledges, which made the people abandon BN in the 14th general election 10 months ago.
After all, it was under Tok Mat’s leadership that BN, combined with PAS, trumped PH in the last two by-elections in Cameron Highlands and Semenyih — the latter which had been won by Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM) in GE14.
While Umno and PAS were at the forefront of the charge in Cameron Highlands and Semenyih, it will now be time for MCA and MIC to play a bigger role in Rantau, even if both have yet to fully recover from their devastating defeat.
Having reached a decision to remain in BN two weeks ago, MCA and MIC will have to carry out their role to bring back the lost Chinese and Indian votes.
With Indian voters comprising 27 per cent and Chinese voters 19 per cent of the total 20,926 voters, both the MCA and MIC have to work extra hard to regain back their support.
MCA has to touch base again with the Chinese community to find issues that can rally the Chinese behind it, while MIC has to cut down its internal party politics and assure the Indian community that it has what it takes to champion their causes.
MCA may find the going rough as DAP has proven to be an effective representative for the Chinese community which explained the reason behind the community not shifting their support for DAP in the past two by-elections — Cameron Highlands and Semenyih.
