Racing to woo the Chinese in Johor

The Mentri Besar of Johor was accused of arrogance for refusing to work with DAP but non-Malays in the state admire his technocratic and hard-working style

DATUK Onn Hafiz Ghazi has aged so much in his more than four years as Mentri Besar of Johor.

He looked so young and boyish when he took over from Datuk Seri Hasni Mohammad in 2022 but these days, it is as though he is carrying the weight of Johor on his shoulders.

Or as some in Umno joke, he looked young enough to be Hasni’s son back then but now looks like he could be Hasni’s brother.

The coming weeks will probably age him even more as Barisan Nasional seeks a new mandate from the people on July 11.

Onn Hafiz, 47, has been the target of fierce attacks by those in Pakatan Harapan for rejecting DAP and for saying that he would rather give up his Mentri Besar post than work with DAP.

That was awkward because Umno and DAP leaders are partners in Putrajaya.

DAP secretary-general Anthony Loke added salt and pepper to the issue, calling Onn Hafiz arrogant and saying: “Your president sits next to me every week. Just to let you know, thank you.”

The DAP base is overwhelmingly Chinese and Onn Hafiz was slammed as arrogant and a racist while almost every top DAP leader jumped in to tell off the caretaker Mentri Besar.

For a while, it looked like Onn Hafiz had delivered a silver bullet to Pakatan which needs Chinese support to hold on to the 10 seats that they won in 2022.

Johor is currently in some sort of political twilight zone where Barisan and Pakatan are friends in Putrajaya but enemies in the state election.

But Onn Hafiz has a good reputation among Johoreans and their regard for him cuts across race line. His overall rating on a scale of one to 10, hovers between seven and eight.

They approve of the way he has managed the state, with investments pouring in the last few years and Singaporeans pouring in every weekend. 

The Chinese in particular admire his hard-working reputation and the fact that he is able to work well with the palace. 

No other Mentri Besar has put in as much effort in tackling the cross-border traffic problem between Johor and Singapore which some claim is one of the busiest in the world.

Around 300,000 people cross the border daily and the volume increases to half a million on long weekends and public holidays. There is still much to be done but Onn Hafiz is constantly hammering out the flaws.

“This is typical of the Chinese. They like hard-working people. Some of them even say the MB works too hard,” said Sin Chew Daily deputy editor-in-chief Ho Wan Mee.

Ho, who is based in Johor Baru, said the Chinese have also been watching Onn Hafiz struggle to learn Mandarin. 

He gave a six-minute speech in Mandarin during a Chinese New Year event in Muar. It was quite a painful rendition but the audience loved it.  

The Mentri Besar got top marks for effort but the intonation complexities of Mandarin is tough to master and Ho, who is always frank and honest in her opinion, gave him 3/10 for pronunciation. 

“What impresses us is that he keeps trying. He does not give up,” said Ho with a laugh.

But will Onn Hafiz’s remarks about rejecting DAP cost him Chinese votes?

The reality is that the Johor election will eventually boil down to wooing the Chinese votes. 

Chinese make up 37% of the Johor population and they enabled Pakatan, with the help of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, to capture Johor in 2018.

Whether those working in Singapore return to vote and who they vote for could decide the fate of Pakatan.

Barisan is confident that their members will not run off to support other parties again after all those signals from the Malay Rulers calling for Malay unity and the endless anti-DAP propaganda from Malay political parties. 

But they are less sure about Chinese support. 

Feedback from Chinese political watchers suggests that many Pakatan supporters are still reluctant to support Barisan even though they agree that Onn Hafiz has delivered.

As such, those who say they want to stay home on election are usually those who are disappointed with Pakatan but do not want to vote for another party. It is a form of passive protest.

However, many Chinese businessmen are quite satisfied with the state government and are open to maintaining the status quo. They say that their problem is with federal policies and not the state.

“Many of my friends have given up hope, they don’t want to vote. But they like (Datuk Seri Rafizi Ramli) and they are watching Bersama. They may change their mind,” said a retired civil servant in an upscale neighbourhood in the Larkin area of Johor Baru.

Pagoh MCA division chairman Datuk Lim Pay Hen cautioned that third force parties should not be underestimated. 

Lim, tasked to rope in party veterans to campaign for MCA, said parties like Bersama and Muda may struggle to win but they have the power to split the votes for more established parties.

Onn Hafiz and his supporters spent days doing damage control over his anti-DAP remark.

He is fortunate that DAP is no longer worshipped like some deity. 

There was a time when the party’s Chinese supporters would have gone berserk over criticism about their beloved party.

These people still love DAP but the burden of governing has exposed the flaws and weaknesses of almost every political party.

The state election will be a test of the Chinese mood in the peninsula.

Given that Chinese support is crucial to Pakatan’s survival, the outcome in Johor will be like reading the tea leaves to predict what lies ahead for Pakatan.

 

> The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own