Today’s lesson:
Vote Buying and Cleintalism.
PREAMBLE:
This orgy of giving, giving and
giving our money away to buy votes for UMNO and to the less deserving UMNO
causes must stop. What Najib tried to do in Sibu and failed he is trying to do
to the whole country –with, I am sure, ultimately the same result. But what
is Najib to do when vote buying and clientelism enjoy widespread electoral
support and does influence voting behaviour?
Our problem is that bad behaviour by
UMNO is good politics for UMNO and good politics by UMNO is bad politics for
UMNO. An incongruent paradox indeed! From Mahathir, UMNO understood that it needed an alignment between vote buying and the economic development of the country : a
judicious balance in itself requiring the wisdom of King Solomon if UMNO is to win in elections.
Najib has taken this to another
level. Vote buying and clientelism is central to his platform of winning the 13th
general election. The economic development of Malaysia has now taken a back seat.
CLIENTELISM : The exchange of votes for favors conditional
on being elected.
None demonstrated cleintelism so
directly as his pact with the people of Sibu where he offered RM5 Million on
condition of having the BN representative elected. Suffice to say that
cleintelism works better for the incumbents than for the opposition as the incumbent normally has deeper pockets!
VOTE FOR CASH: Vote for cash or
other tangible rewards is
a straight forward I scratch your back you
scratch
mine situation.
While the opposition might be
inclined to dabble in this should the opportunity arises, Najib has fine tuned this into an art
form with the tabling of the recent budget. Consider this:
·
RM2 Billion of infrastructure
contracts reserved for
Bumiputra/UMNO/cronies owned businesses.
·
Ethnic Chinese voters : No new Taxes.
·
One off payment of RM500 to all
households with a
monthly income of RM3000 or less.
·
The wages, bonus and pensions of 1.3
million civil
servants will rise.
·
Retirement age will rise to 60 years
old.
·
BN will maintain subsidies programme
on key
commodities including sugar and petrol.
With one foul swoop Najib has
established himself as the Mother of Vote Buying in Malaysia!
But vote buying has no clear
vote-enforcement mechanism. You give the voters their inducement now and if
they do not vote for you…say la ve!
Cleintelism has the added advantage
of requiring the voters to vote for the candidate since only if the candidate
is elected will the voters receive the agreed benefit!
End of Lesson!
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