SIMPLE ANALYSIS

assalamualaikum,

not to provoke or something else, just want to open our mind...

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Analysis of the 11th General Elections 2004 – Kuala Terengganu

The first impression one gets is that the opposition was practically wiped out in the recently concluded 11th General Elections on 21 March 2004 due to a shift of voters. The perception is that the Malay voters went back to the Barisan Nasional (BN), in particular Umno, while the Chinese voters flocked to the Democratic Action Party (DAP).

But is this what really happened? Not really.

Early calculations show that the Islamic Party of Malaysia (PAS) actually saw a nationwide increase of 0.8% in its popular vote from 15% in 1999 to 15.8% in 2004. Parti Keadilan Nasional (keADILan), however, saw a slide of only 3%, not quite
enough to result in its wipe out. (Detailed figures are being worked out and a follow-up to this piece will be done as soon as they are in).

In the state of Terengganu, the opposition obtained 181,767 votes for the eight Parliament seats in 1999 compared to 169,934 this time around, a drop of only 11,833 votes or 6.51%. This was not enough to give BN a landslide win. (We shall work on the 32 state seats in due course).

If so, then why did BN almost make a clean sweep of Terengganu State save for four of the 32 state seats? Some say it is the ‘new’ voters who gave BN its landslide win. Looking at the increase in voter registration, however, this could not be
possible.

Between the 1995 and 1999 elections, the new voters increased by 5.3%. Between 1999 and 2004, it increased a further 7%-8%. The increase in voters for Terengganu State though was 17.7%, more than double that the national average. Why this larger than national average increase?

Now let us look at the results for Kuala Terengganu.

In 1999, Syed Azman Syed Ahmad Nawawi obtained 31,580 votes, defeating Datuk Abu Bakar Daud who obtained 17,132 votes. (Datuk Bakar retired from politics thereafter and went on to become an ambassador).

In this election, Syed Azman obtained 29,061 votes, a drop of 2,519 votes or 7.98%. Seeing that Syed Azman had a majority of 14,448 votes in 1999, he could more than afford these 2,519 votes decline quite comfortably.

However, one factor that probably turned Syed Azman’s win into defeat is the exceptionally large voter turnout.

In 1999, 48,712 voters turned out to vote in Kuala Terengganu. This year it was 72,259, an increase of 48.34%. How could Kuala Terengganu see an increase of 48.34% voters when the national voter increase average is only 7%-8% while the state average is 17.7%, which in itself far exceeds the national average?

Because of this extraordinary voter turnout, Syed Azman’s challenger, Razali Ismail, obtained 30,994 votes, giving him a 1,933 majority. But what was even stranger was the 10,254 ‘missing votes’. What it means here is that 72,259 people came out to vote but they found only 60,055 ballot papers in the ballot boxes. 10,254 ballot papers mysteriously
went missing. http://result.spr.gov.my/paparan.asp?codepasser=036 http://result.spr.gov.my

Is this possible? Can 10,254 people walk into the polling station and walk out again after collecting their ballot papers without putting them into the ballot box? There are so many pairs of eyes watching you from the time you walk into the
polling station till the time you walk out again.

Every polling station has Polling Agents from all the competing parties who would certainly hit the roof and raise hell if even one voter was to walk out of the polling station without putting his or her ballot paper into the ballot box, let alone 10,254 voters. It would not be possible for one person, let alone 10,254 people, to pocket the ballot papers and not put it into the ballot box. Anyway, why would anyone, let alone 10,254 people, take all that trouble to go to the polling station just to put the ballot paper into his or her pocket?

Assuming the 10,254 voters slipped the ballot papers into their pockets and instead slipped a worthless piece of paper into the ballot box, then 10,254 scraps of worthless paper would have been found in the ballot boxes. However, there were no reports of a single voter walking out of the polling station without putting his or her ballot paper into the ballot box and neither were there any reports of discovering 10,254 worthless scraps of paper in the ballot boxes. What happened was, everyone who walked into the polling stations put their ballot papers into the ballot box yet 10,254 ballot papers just disappeared.

Certainly there is more than meets the eye here and we shall analyse the other seats in Terengganu to see whether there are any unexplained mysteries there as well.

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think about it...