STILL wondering why Najib Razak and other Umno leaders were so divorced from reality and actually didn’t entertain the possibility of being in the opposition?

Still puzzled why Najib did not leave the country before he and Rosmah Mansor were put on an immigration blacklist?

The answers to these questions were provided during the former prime minister’s love fest with his cocooned supporters in his sanctuary of Pekan in Pahang.

It was surreal because it seemed that Najib was still campaigning for GE14 and Umno grassroots and Barisan Nasional supporters were in a time capsule. They were still cheering his fighting talk and laughing at his jabs at Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.  

They seemed oblivious to one startling fact: the voters of Malaysia had spoken and their champion had been knocked out.

The Pekan episode yesterday could have been replicated in any Umno constituency across Malaysia.

In these places, a mutual admiration echo chamber has grown louder over the years. The leader tells his ground troops that everything is good, and the foot soldiers and supporters, pleased to be on the conveyor belt of small projects and regular cash payments, are happy to repeat the leader’s refrain.

‎In time, the leader and his followers believe that everything is okay. This “semua OK” syndrome nearly cost Najib dearly in 1999 when he retained Pekan by 241 votes.

He pledged then to never be lulled into complacency again by the sugar-coated assurances of aides.

But leaders across the globe prefer the good news instead of the real news. So even when official election estimates plunged from a 150-seat victory to 119 seats a week ahead May 9, Najib was bullish.

Indeed, he told a friend that he was overly pessimistic. It was the same situation with other Umno leaders. Their hardcore supporters told them that victory was in the bag, and cheered by this “ground reading”, they too repeated this mantra.

The echo chamber led them to defeat. Now it keeps them in a hilarious state of denial.

Want to know how badly Najib was rejected by Malaysians? Here are some facts to digest:

1. Nearly 65% of voters voted against Najib and BN. BN’s popular vote plunged from 46.7% in GE13 to 33.9% in GE14.

2. The anti-BN swing was felt in all states in Malaysia, with the tsunami felt most in Kedah where BN’s support fell by 19.8%.

3. Malays, including civil servants, abandoned Umno/BN. Tengku Adnan won his Putrajaya seat with only 49.5% of the popular vote, compared with almost 70% five years ago.

4. Even the police and army voters seemed to have given up on Najib and BN. The four parliament seats with more than 10,000 early voters were won by Pakatan Harapan.

5. Of the 83 mixed Parliament seats on offer, PH won 73 ‎and BN won the remaining 10.

All these facts taken together show how far removed Najib, his ministers, and their core support base were to the real situation in Malaysia.

That’s the perennial danger of being in an echo chamber. You hear only what you want to hear. – May 21, 2018.