30 May 2014
'DAP resorting to dirty tactics to fish for votes'
By Shahrum Sayuthi
PERSONAL ATTACKS: Party going overboard with comments about BN, says Mah
THE mild-mannered Datuk Mah Siew Keong is not a man who easily gets upset.
But when asked about DAP's aggressive campaigning tactics for the Teluk Intan by-election, the Barisan Nasional candidate found it hard to conceal his feelings.
"I have contested many times over the past 20 years. However, I have never encountered having my poster smeared with the word 'bodoh' (stupid)," he said on Tuesday.
As campaigning for the by-election enters its final stage, DAP is stepping up its attacks against BN. Mah is of course at the centre of the cross hairs.
At its nightly ceramah, DAP leaders and their allies from PKR and Pas are depicting Mah as weak, an Umno lackey and president of a dead party, in reference to Gerakan.
On Tuesday night at the Anson Industrial Park, DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang did not even bother to go through the usual niceties in the opening of his speech but instead directly launched an attack on Mah, among others, rubbishing the latter's manifesto, which was launched earlier on the same day.
After he was done with Mah, Lim proceeded to attack other BN leaders, such as Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his deputy, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.
Other speakers, such as Lim's son Guan Eng, who is the chief minister of Penang and opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, repeated the same pattern of aggressive speeches without even sparing retired BN leaders such as former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Mah's predecessor, former Gerakan president Tan Sri Koh Tsu Koon.
The usual allegations of corruption and bad governance were bandied about by all the speakers, which, without a doubt, were intended to instil hatred against BN.
Such was the aggressive tone of the speeches that Anwar, at one point, even remarked that members of the Chinese community, who supported BN, were "stupid".
"The prime minister came and said, 'Apa lagi Cina mahu' (what else do the Chinese want), and there was a minister who had labelled the Chinese as intruders. Yet, there are still members from the community who had shouted 'Long live BN'.
"Chinese of these sort are really stupid," Anwar allegedly said.
Such rhetoric, despite their factual inaccuracy, have after all been a potent weapon wielded by DAP and its allies since the 2008 General Election.
This time, Mah has to bear the full brunt as all of the opposition's "big guns" were in Teluk Intan in support of his opponent, Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud of DAP.
Mah, in contrast, told his campaign workers not to be confrontational or retaliate in the face of provocation.
He gave instructions to those campaigning on his behalf not to touch on the personality of his opponent and her family members.
It was rare for the names of DAP and other opposition leaders to be mentioned by speakers at BN campaign functions.
The focus of BN's campaign has always been on what the ruling coalition can offer to the people.
As the campaigning winds down for polling on Saturday, the people of Teluk Intan are presented with two choices which can be reflected by the way both sides have conducted themselves over the past two weeks.
Read more: 'DAP resorting to dirty tactics to fish for votes' - Columnist - New Straits Times http://www.nst.com.my/opinion/columnist/dap-resorting-to-dirty-tactics-to-fish-for-votes-1.607947#ixzz339ZPPEUw
