NOVEMBER 5 — It recurs with no outcome and stays tepid till the next election.
We’re talking about age, that candidates are too young.
In this Melaka election the spotlight is on Amanah’s Muhammad Mukhlisul Mubin Julaisapiyah, aged 25, in coastal Kuala Linggi (N01) connected to Negeri Sembilan, and PKR’s Farzana Hayani Mohd Nasir, 26, much further down the coast closer to the city at Kelebang (N14).
Their age turns into a lightning rod on social media.
Perhaps answers are necessary. I want to ignore the urge to end this examination with the churlish and clichéd “age is just a number”. It is a number but to sidestep it only forces a rerun. Also, it’s lazy. As lazy as the comments online.
So, here’s an attempt at answers.
Apples and apples
For a useful comparison, Mukhlisul, the UKM law graduate, faces one-term Barisan Nasional (BN) assemblyman Rosli Abdullah, aged 58 and a deputy exco. There’s a lot of history, however, but not between the candidates.
Julasapiah Kasim, Mukhlisul’s dad has been the failed Kuala Linggi candidate for 22 years except one time. Five times he failed to unseat BN in Kuala Linggi, four of those times as a PAS man.
His family has contested Kuala Linggi — unsuccessfully — even before he was born. Mukhlisul wins on familiarity but is also a beneficiary of family ties to get the ticket this young.
Farzana squares off against two-time assemblyman and exco Lim Ban Hong (BN-MCA). He’s 49. He lost in 2018 after his first term, only to regain it in 2021. He was a senator and deputy MITI minister in those Covid-19 years but failed to win the Tangga Batu parliamentary seat in 2022.
The Melaka MCA chairman has had his ups and down and is a clearcut favourite. Him losing after party president Wee Ka Siong sulked till MCA got two more seats to contest would be a slap to the organisation. Never has MCA been gladder to have PAS in its corner.
The PKR candidate surprisingly is a second-time candidate. She was 21, when she was fielded in Jasin’s Sungai Rambai in 2021.
Barely Legal
The Undi-18 bill was passed in 2019 and also reduced the age eligibility of candidates.
Legally, 18 is enough to have your name on the ballot.
Yes, but only barely is the retort.
The critics are OK with 18-year-olds working as McDonald’s crew but not as a board member in the Malaysian franchise. Maybe 25-26 is adequate to be assistant manager but surely not to be a member in the Melaka assembly.
Most of the civil servants would be older than them. They risk being mistaken as interns.
They will not have as they say, years spent on earth therefore accumulated mistakes which are branded as experience today.
This must be conceded. Nevertheless, a lot of older representatives are equally bamboozled by civil servants and the issues of the day.
Yet there is the argument, younger reps are wired-in to issues of artificial intelligence, youth employment, environmental care, tourism, public transportation and urban development. There is a need to have the perspectives of twentysomethings in a hall with the majority in their fifties and above.
Here’s some inconvenient truths, young people bring energy. This is not the worst thing to have in an assembly to serve the people of Melaka.
They may be open to transparency far, far more than those much-much older raised in a system where the government turns its wheels in the dark.
Pounding it in more, the lack of experience also deciphers as not burdened by the past as in less defensive to unlearn and adopt new thinking.
These are nett positives. An age mix in the assembly is a boon, not a bane.
Then, there is the often not stated reality. Mukhlisul and Farzana know they are young and are reminded of it casually and indirectly daily. That they choose to stand up and be in the fray must matter too. They are willing to take the heat in the kitchen.
Die-hard remakes
While most reach back to Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman’s mercurial rise at 25 to be appointed youth minister, there’s an evergreen example to top it.
Soon to be in house arrest and sometime prime minister Najib Razak won his first parliamentary election as a 22-year-old in 1976.
Granted, his dad’s passing improbably shoved him onto the stage, it did not stop the party naming him six years later as Pahang menteri besar. When he was 28 in 1982.
Here in 2026, many still quibble about Farzana trying to enter the assembly of a small state at 26.
Or are the rules different for those who have blue blood?
To suggest it is conceivable to accept younger candidates if they are from the right families and set the bar higher for those who are not.
They count votes over here
The discussion of age is actually an extension of the fuller need for candidate disclosure.
Does age matter? Definitely, young and old, and very old. Experience? A hundred per cent.
So do examinations about educational background and whether degrees were dished out by dodgy organisations serenading as universities.
In short, let the voters know as much as they can. Which acts as a shout out for public debates, which is shunned by 90 per cent of candidates from all sides. If speaking against opponents is too daunting then perhaps they should not speak for their constituencies in the assembly.
But after that is done, there is the most critical aspect of a vibrant democracy.
The voters decide. Whether for the wrong or right reasons. Their judgement is decree.
That’s the ultimate filter.
And the voters are made of all folks 18 and above. While the young numerically dominate the electoral roll, the outstanding attendance rate of voters 40 and above renders them kingmakers.
Mukhlisul and Farzana have to present themselves electable to voters in Kuala Linggi and Kelebang.
The voters, young and old, get to make their determination.
Who are we to adjudicate the judgement of the people?
How young is decided by voters.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
