THE crowded field of contenders for the Port Dickson parliamentary seat will benefit star candidate Anwar Ibrahim.

Analysts said that far from denting the PKR leader’s chances of victory, running against six other candidates in the coming by-election would likely make his return to Parliament a cakewalk.

“From a pure competition standpoint, the more candidates run against Anwar, the better his results will be. Independent candidates tend to do poorly,” said Merdeka Centre executive director Ibrahim Suffian.

The by-election on October 13 sees a seven-cornered fight with five independents in the ring – Saiful Bukhari Azlan, Isa Samad, Lau Seck Yan, Stevie Chan and Kan Chee Yuen. PAS’ Mohd Nazari Mokhtar, an airforce retiree, is the sixth contender..

Ilham Centre’s Mohd Azlan Zainal said none of the independent candidates were expected to pose a real threat to Anwar.

“The independent candidates will not be able to have any big impact on Anwar Ibrahim, and serve only to prevent a walkover ,” he said.

“The only one who will provide some competition is Isa because he is a local candidate.”

Merdeka Centre’s Ibrahim said Isa, a former Umno strongman and ex-Negri Sembilan menteri besar, could be serious contender if he was running as a Barisan Nasional candidate.

“But given that he’s running as an independent and without formal Umno backing, it probably means his ability to garner votes will be limited,” Ibrahim told The Malaysian Insight.

Not too different from GE14

Associate professor Mohd Faisal S. Hazis of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia said it was unlikely that the voting trend in PD would differ from the 14th general election, adding that the multi-challengers would only serve to split votes for the opposition.

Port Dickson has 75,212 voters,  42% of them Malay, 33% Chinese and 22% Indian across the five state seats of Chuah, Lukut, Bagan Pinang, Sri Tanjung and Linggi.

The PH candidate for GE14 Danyal Balagopal Abdullah won the seat with 36,225 votes, beating BN candidate V. Mogan, who got 18,515 votes, and PAS’ Mahfuz Roslan, who received 6,594 votes.

Faisal said based on an analysis by pollster Merdeka Centre, over 90% of the Chinese votes and some 84% of the Indian votes went to PH in the May 9 poll.

“Of the Malay votes, only 22% went to PH, 41% to BN and 30% to PAS. The non-Malay votes had helped PH.”

Intrigue

Ibrahim of Merdeka Centre said Umno’s decision to stay out of the by-election was “interesting”, and correlated with party president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s recent overtures to Pakatan Harapan.

Zahid had said that Umno was free to discuss with any party “whether they are out of Barisan Nasional, or whether they were once in BN and are no longer so.”

Saiful Bukhari’s decision to run against Anwar, whom he famously accused of sodomising him in 2008 was likely meant to remind voters of the former deputy prime minister’s past.

“Saiful Bukhari adds intrigue. I think he was put in the by-election by Anwar’s enemies to remind the man of his past.

“Saiful Bukhari may say he has put the past behind him. But his mere presence will be a reminder of Anwar’s past,” said Faisal from UKM.

Anwar was convicted of sodomising Saiful Bukhari and was serving the tail end of a five-year jail sentence when he received a royal pardon and was released after PH took Putrajaya in May.

Professor Sivamurugan Pandian from Universiti Sains Malaysia’s Social Sciences School said even though the independent candidates stand a slim chance of defeating Anwar, their candidacy gave the Port Dickson by-election more excitement than the previous Seri Setia, Balakong and Sungai Kandis by-elections.

“Saiful Bukhari brings some colour but I don’t see the three Chinese independent candidates having impact,” he said.

Sivamurugan said the challenge for Anwar was to win big to legitimise his place as the next prime minister.

To do so, Anwar and PH would need to rally for a high voter turnout than the dismal numbers in the last three by-elections.

“There have been people questioning his timing to return to parliament and other issues. He cannot let this continue, so he has to show he has the majority support.

“Anwar is popular in Port Dickson. If he can get the PH machinery together, there should not be a problem,” said Sivamurugan.

“But we don’t know to what extent all this will encourage a better voter turnout than the last three by-elections.” –  September 30, 2018.