Bogeyman vs punching bag

DID anyone really believe that Umno and DAP could become friends after years of running down one another and sowing seeds of hatred about each other?

They have tried to get along but they are like oil and water, able to float alongside each other but unable to mix.

Ties between the two parties are rather frayed at the moment and the blame has been directed at the controversial Umno Youth chief Datuk Dr Muhammad Akmal Saleh.

Using DAP as what Chinese newspaper columnist Jeff Ooi called the “punching bag”, has confirmed him as DAP’s enemy number one.

DAP supporters find him to be divisive and racist but his political standing in Umno is on the rise after his fierce attacks at the Umno general assembly.

On the other hand, the DAP leader currently at the top of the most-disliked list among the Umno crowd is Puchong MP Yeo Bee Yin for her “celebration” remark when the courts denied Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s bid to serve his sentence under house arrest.

She is being celebrated by her party for that but condemned by Umno for being disrespectful, which led to an Umno politician from Selangor to conclude that DAP will not win over the Malays with this type of leader.

But does Yeo give a hoot about what Umno thinks of her? She is intelligent, has a big personality, her husband is a billionaire and rich people operate at a different level.

DAP and Umno are not only like oil and water but what appeals to the base of one party is anathema to the base of the other party. The hero of one party is a nuisance to the other.

DAP leaders at the Selangor party convention last weekend have hit back at Umno, implying that the party is unreasonable and ungrateful for what DAP has done.

Selangor DAP chairman Ng Sze Han alluded to claiming back the Dusun Tua state seat that his party had sacrificed to Umno in the state election.

Ng, who is a senior state executive councillor, said DAP’s sincerity towards Umno had been reciprocated with attacks and accusations.

DAP is the king of the hill in Selangor where Umno is like a side table in a room with big furniture pieces and even PKR would falter without DAP’s hold over Chinese sentiments.

DAP secretary-general Anthony Loke, who officiated at the Selangor convention, had to douse another type of fire, namely, Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s claim that those making disrespectful remarks about Umno were from “Team B” of DAP.

“I can sense his frustration that DAP was made the punching bag at the Umno AGM whereas there was hardly any criticism of Perikatan Nasional,” said Ooi.

Loke insisted there is only one team in his party and that is Team DAP.

Ahmad Zahid’s claim of a “Team B” in DAP may be off the mark but it was his way of connecting the dots because Yeo is an acolyte of Tony Pua who was the former political secretary and strategist to Lim Guan Eng when he was Finance Minister.

Moreover, Yeo had been passionate in claiming that the undersea tunnel corruption case against Lim was political prosecution.

All that hardly adds up to the existence of a “Team B” but perception is everything in politics.

Speak to people in Penang and they will laughingly tell you there is a Team A, Team B and even a Team C.

One team is allegedly loyal to Lim who, although no longer the Chief Minister, is more vocal and assertive than his successor Chow Kon Yeow.

Another team is perceived to be aligned to Entrepreneur and Cooperatives Development Minister Steven Sim while the third team is said to comprise the old guards led by Chief Minister Chow.

The dynamics within these three alleged teams will have implications on who becomes the next Chief Minister of Penang.

“DAP’s priority at the moment is to reconstruct the Chinese narrative. The earth has loosened beneath their feet since becoming the government,” said Ooi.

The defeat in the Sabah election presented the classic crisis situation which in Chinese calligraphy is made up of two characters, “danger” and “turning point”, with the latter often interpreted as “opportunity”.

To do nothing spells danger and Loke chose the path of opportunity. He set a six-month deadline for the unity government to deliver on the reforms promised and he has announced plans for a special convention in July to take stock and review the progress made.

The reforms have started to trickle out from moves to limit the term of the Prime Minister to changes in the education sector.

“But issues keep cropping up to heat up the runway towards the general election,” said Ooi.

For instance, an attempt to rename a stretch of road near an established Chinese temple in Seberang Perai sparked off a racially-tinged protest led by a right-wing Malay NGO who are against the name change from Jalan Pantai Bersih to Lorong Dragon Temple.

The 155-year-old temple is located in Bagan where Lim is the MP and protestors displayed placards telling him to go back to Melaka.

The issue has made headlines in the Chinese media and although Lim is not the popular or untouchable personality that he once was, he has stepped forward as the voice of the Chinese or rather, the voice that DAP used to be - fierce and uncompromising.

The centralised pig-farming project proposed by the Selangor government is yet another instance of the opposing needs and priorities of the races.

A proposal to relocate the pig farms to Bukit Tagar in the north-east of Selangor which is largely populated by Malays has outraged Muslims.

Pig farms stink to high heaven and commentary on social media is flowing like hot lava with people demanding that it should be tried out first in a Chinese new village.

DAP politicians have tried hard to showcase that their party is multi-racial. But each time it takes a step forward with the Malays, something happens and it falls two steps backwards.

The party’s place in the government requires working with Umno but it must not ever forget that its survival rests on support from non-Malay support.