Trying to win ‘grey’ seats

Flag war: Political party flags decorating a pedestrian walkway as candidates pull out all the stops to woo voters. — AZHAR MAHFOF/The Star

PETALING JAYA: The next few days will see a flurry of appearances by political heavyweights, as well as more ceramah and social media outreach to sway fence-sitters and ramp up support ahead of polling day on Saturday.

Some are checking on their safe seats and keeping track of “grey areas”, while others are looking to rev up their strategies before campaigning for the 15th General Election (GE15) officially stops at midnight on Friday.

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Barisan Nasional election communications chief Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek said it was constantly monitoring the 191 seats it was contesting in, of the 222 parliamentary seats.

“At the moment, our approach is to identify and check on our hardcore supporters (pengundi putih) in each constituency.

“In some areas, we have more than 50% while in others, it is below that, but we are in the midst of updating the number of our hardcore supporters,” he said.

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On Barisan’s strategy to woo fence-sitters, Ahmad Shabery said it was tracking the “grey” seats, areas that could be turned into safe seats for the coalition.

“We have to make various cross-checks first between our list and that from an outside survey.

“Sometimes, in our list, a constituency may be considered a safe seat, but perhaps we are unsure if our voters are now outside of their polling area like the Klang Valley.

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“We will get the relevant information to determine if our ‘grading’ is correct,” he said, adding that once this was done, Barisan would try to identify various factors that could change voting patterns.

“Some of these could be due to national issues but some are simple, such as localised issues within their village or asking the candidates to call and talk to them on the phone.

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“So, these are all the factors that we are currently updating based on attitudes,” added Ahmad Shabery.

In Penang, state MCA Youth chief Lim Swee Bok said with a significant number of young voters this time, the party’s candidates had turned to social media as their main platform.

“In the final week, candidates started creating more content on social media to reach out to voters, especially first-timers and youth.

“At the same time, candidates are also meeting young voters face to face to better understand their needs and help explain the election because for many, this would be their first time voting,” he said.

PKR strategic director Sim Tze Tzin said its main focus now was to explain to voters how Pakatan would manage the economy, especially during ceramah.

“This is because the current main issue is the high cost of living and inflation faced by the rakyat, so we will compare our performance against that of Barisan, Perikatan Nasional and Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS),” he said.

PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, his deputy Rafizi Ramli and other party heavyweights would continue with ceramah across the country, added Sim.

Muda media liaison head Leben Siddarth said its candidates were mainly focused on physical campaigning as well as pushing out more content on social media.

“We will have more engagement with communities in the parliamentary seats. We are also doing multiple online campaigns for fence-sitters and educational videos on the importance of voting and voting wisely,” he said.