BACK AND FORTH: Candidates has yet to be filled but there already so much stories from Johor

Johor Barisan Nasional (BN) announced that they will contest in all 56 State Assembly seats (DUN) on its own.

This means they will not be carrying out any cooperation with any other political parties during the Johor State Elections, dividing the seats only among Umno, MCA and MIC.

The upcoming polls will likely see the same situation as Melaka whereby BN will operate solo without any of their Federal friends.

Since the dissolution on Saturday by caretaker Menteri Besar Datuk Hasni Mohammad, focus was now been diverted to the potential Menteri Besar (MB) candidates as well those who will contest.

The Melaka Polls saw various “firsts” in the world of Malaysian elections including new campaigning procedures during a pandemic as well as political parties announcing their MB candidate prior to result day.

This has opened doors to what the Johor Elections could possibly look like.

As of now, BN/Umno has listed three possible MB candidates for the state. One of them is the incumbent.

The other two candidates are still up for grabs as members at the Division level have been asked to vote for two people to be considered as a candidate for the state seat.

Two names have appeared in the candidates list, among them include a much-talked about 25-year old candidate expected to contest at one of the DUNs in Muar.

Sinar Daily was also made to understand that a few State Excos have expressed their desires to contest for Parliament in the next General Election (GE), while there were also those who planning to retire after helming the seat for three terms.

The Wanita, Youth and Puteri wings will be requesting their fair share of seats thus adding more burden to the state chair to make the final list of candidates

There has also been talk that MCA only plans to contest in bulletproof seats while MIC has also taken precautions to contest in at least five seats statewide.

Prior to the dissolution, MIC had won three state seats.

Their biggest challenge here for MIC is to defend their seats against DAP.

DAP will defend 14 state seats but if the Melaka sentiments were to be taken into consideration, Johor MCA and MIC would likely be more confident that they could win over several seats from DAP as how Melaka BN did previously.

The big question now is PKR. They had faced a terrible loss in Sarawak and Melaka.

They must bounce back and prove that they are still relevant and has been the voters’ choice.

Bersatu which comprised 11 state representatives and Pas (1), which was said to have been dissatisfied with BN/Umno’s decision to dissolve the state assembly without first obtaining the approval of the State Exco will face a tough situation.

This is because, upon the dissolution of the state assembly, they will no longer be a part of the state government.

They now need to mobillise their own machinery although without being fully prepared for the polls.

In the previous elections, Bersatu had won big when it contested as part of Pakatan Harapan (PH). Now, not so much.

With the decision by BN/Umno to contest solo (just like in Melaka), Bersatu and Pas need to find the most effective ‘magic formula’ to compete.

Not to mention, in Johor, Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah), which previously won six seats, will also be competing for the same seats.

Logically speaking, Pas will enter the ring to win over the seats from Amanah.

With Umno in the picture, we could be looking at three-cornered fight, not including independent candidates.

In Melaka, although BN/Umno did not suffer for split votes, the other parties did.

This happened because there were just too many players involved and trying to entice those who were not in favour of BN/Umno.

These “balance” votes were divided into three to four corners thus making the chance to win slim. Chances to win will only exist if it was a one-on-one showdown. More than that, and victory goes to BN/Umno.

Having five to six candidates in one seat just for the sake of celebrating democracy is pointless if you will only lose and opening the door for the other side to win.

BACK AND FORTH is written by Rozaid Rahman every Monday. Rozaid is the Group Editor-in-Chief and Chief Content Executive of Sinar Karangkraf.