Its nomination day Saturday for candidates planning to contest the April 25 Hulu Selangor by-election.
Nomination opened at 9am and closed at 10am with an hour for objections.
It is a four-corner fight pitting PKR's Zaid Ibrahim agaainst BN's Kalamanathan and 2 independents. One lady wannabe independent got shut out by the police and could not stand as a candidate so it seems.
There are 64,500 registered voters in Hulu Selangor, with 63,701 regular voters and 799 postal voters.Of the total, the Malays make up the majority with 34,020 voters or 52.7%.
The next largest group is the Chinese with 16,964 voters (26.3%) followed by the Indians at 12,453 voters or 19.3%.
This is going to be an interesting fight. A phone in poll by NTV7 tonight showed PKR is a shoo-in at over 90% of the responses.
Let me draw a scenario of the possible outcome.
The two independents have little to fight for without a manifesto and a machinery behind them. They are spoilers and are likely to lose their deposits.
Unless something untoward happens in the run-up to polling day, it looks like a weak BN will be responsible for its own defeat.
There are so many issues coming up or already is political fodder for the PKR to work on and for the voters to digest.
Let me list the potential bugbears for the BN.
1. New compromise candidate who is an unknown in town. Like PKR's Zaid, he is also a stranger in town.
2. The campaign period of 7 days is just too short for Kamalanathan to get the know the local voters
3.The Hulu Selangor area is too big to cover in a week
4.His last minute candidature reflects badly on the MIC. He will lose protest voters who will likely spoil their votes,do not appear on polling day or worse, vote for the opposition and independents
6. He is unlikely to get the support of the younger set of voters who are most likely anti-establishment.
7. He is unlikely to get Felda votes as the problems there have not been successfully resolved.
5.He will face the problems of national issues such as APCO,corruption,lack of transparency, the situation of the Interfaith panel, religious issues and the Teoh Beng Hock trial.
The things going for him will be
1. The postal voters possibly of the police stationed in the Police College in in Kuala Kubu Bahru.
2. A big chunk of the traditional pro-government Malay voters including government civil servants.
3. Some senior Chinese voters who will always be pro-government.
As for Zaid,there should not be many problems. The things going for him will be:
1. The largese of the Selangor State government in giving land titles. This will work well in Chinese dominated areas in new villages and in the township of Kuala Kubu Bharu. MCA with all its brand new 'gungho marketing' will not dent one bit the intent of voters to vote opposition.
2. Zaid is a national figure and has been perceived as upright and principled.
3. Zaid is a potential leader to lead the Pakatan Rakyat in case Anwar should be jailed.
4.The power of the alternative media, blogs, cellular phones, Face-book and Twitter.
Between BN and PKR, Kamalanathan is definitely the underdog. He claimed so himself today. Could he be pleading for sympathy votes? He is not only facing a difficult foe but more importantly, there is going to be sabotage against him both from disgruntled UMNO and MIC members. So, the candle is burnt for him at both end. He is in a hot place!
We will see what else develop till polling day.
