RACE-BAITING and religious bigotry did not have much impact on Malay voters in the general election, analysts said.

Their effects were mainly felt seen the rural areas, the pundits added.

Universiti Teknologi Malaysia political analyst Mazlan Ali told The Malaysian Insight that if race and religion were important, PAS would have won the election.

“It is not the only factor that influenced Malay voters The general sentiment of the Malay voters in GE15 was that they were looking for a party that will continue to fight for Malay-Muslims,” he said.

“Malay voters would have chosen the party even if it were not mentioned in the campaign.

“Resorting to race and religion to win votes is nothing new; it’s been happening for a long time.

“If that were the only factor, PAS would have won a long time ago.

Mazlan said the “Malay tsunami” in Saturday’s polls showed Malay voters, once strong supporters of Barisan Nasional (BN), had turned their backs on the coalition.

He said the anger was due to BN leaders’ involvement in corruption and power abuse.

“One of the reasons for a strong Malay swing towards Perikatan Nasional is because of anger at Umno and BN.

“It’s an issue of integrity, of Umno leaders being corrupt and abusing the power they have… leaders such as president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

“When they saw the likes of Zahid in the general election, they reacted. It isn’t just about race and religion.”

PN made a clean sweep, mainly through PAS, in Kelantan, Terengganu, Perlis, Kedah and Pahang.

The pact won all 14 parliamentary seats in Kelantan, eight in Terengganu and 13 of the 14 seats in Kedah.

In Pahang, PN won seven parliamentary and 17 state seats and in Perak, the coalition won 10 federal and 26 state seats.

PAS bagged 49 seats, the most among all the parties in the general election.

Mazlan also attributed the Malay shift to the influx of newly registered young voters.

“We have to acknowledge PN’s clever use of social media to reach out to these young voters. We predicted this after our study, seeing the kind of influence PN has on social media,” he said.

Universiti Malaya analyst Awang Azman Awang Pawi said the PN campaign with a heavy focus on race and religion had traction among rural voters only.

Awang Azman said this was reflected in the results, which showed the multiracial Pakatan Harapan and comparatively moderate BN sweeping up the Malay votes in the urban seats.

He said the BN campaign placed more emphasis on assisting low-income groups, such as speeding up Bantuan Keluarga Malaysia payments.

“But that did not help and was overshadowed PN and PH tactics,” he said.

Another analyst, Tunku Mohar Tunku Mohd Mokhtar said the BN campaign fell flat even though its leaders had pressed for snap polls.

He said BN had employed old-school communication tactics while PH and PN has made good use of the internet.

“(PH and PN) were also campaigning on an anti-corruption, with PH focusing on good governance and PN on a Malay government,” he said.

Tunku Mohar, of International Islamic University Malaysia, said issues of race and religion did succeed in swaying some fence-sitters.

“Thoese were the undecided voters who had no inkling of the real issues and would believe anything they hear.”

He said such ignorance is a threat to cultural harmony.

Police recently warned against growing racial and religious provocations on social media triggered by the elections.

Among the reported complaints involved well-known personalities campaigning for PN, such as singer Jamal Abdillah and actor Remy Ishak.

Jamal later admitted that his claim that the call to prayer would no longer be heard in Penang if DAP continued to govern the state was baseless.

Remy was condemned for threatening to “slaughter the infidels”.

A video of Sik PAS youth chairman Mohd Shahiful Mhd Nasir saying that BN and PH supporters will go to hell went viral.

PN chairman Muhyiddin Yassin was caught on video accusing PH of sponsoring the Jewish agenda and aiming to Christianise Malaysia. – November 22, 2022.