PETALING JAYA: Pakatan Harapan’s chances of securing 30% of the Malay votes in the 15th General Election (GE15) and possibly put the coalition back to power is “doable”, says PKR deputy president Rafizi Ramli (pic).
He said a PKR survey found a shift of Malay support for Pakatan, partly due to dissatisfaction over the government’s effort in addressing the rising cost of living.
“From July to August, we saw an upswing of 4% of Malay support for PKR and Pakatan. So things are very dynamic,” he said yesterday.
As for the 27 seats which are considered marginal, he said that most of them were PKR seats.
“These seats are usually constituencies where Malay voters are between 60% and 70%,” he said.
He also said PKR and Pakatan’s candidates were predicted to win in a straight fight against a Barisan Nasional-Perikatan Nasional combination in the polls.
On Saturday night, Rafizi gave a ceramah in Johor Baru.
Speaking to reporters after the ceramah, he said: “I noticed from the reaction of those in attendance was that they were not hardcore party supporters. Most of them were fence-sitters.
“So, no matter what you say, there will not be much reaction.
“This is actually a good sign. Previously, we failed to convince fence-sitters to go out and vote during the state election. So, I think we are now on the right track.”
Rafizi said the outcome of the Johor state election in March, which was won by Barisan, would not be an indication of Barisan or Umno’s chances in GE15.
“We can see that Umno is also having clashes in Johor.
“Umno supreme council leaders have set a target for Barisan to win 20 seats in the state but Johor Umno feels that 16 is a more realistic figure. It shows that they lack confidence,” he claimed.
On a separate matter, Rafizi said Malaysian United Democratic Alliance’s (Muda) application to join Pakatan would not affect ongoing seat negotiations among existing coalition members.
“By Sept 30, we will have a full list of seats to contest among PKR, DAP, Parti Amanah Negara and Upko,” he said, adding that Muda’s application to join Pakatan would need to go through the process first.
“Questions on how Muda could work with Pakatan would be a matter to be discussed at the next stage,” he said.
