"Malaysia Decides"

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I forgot to say, it is the Malaysian general election today.

It's been impossible to miss as the streets in every town are swamped with banners, and on the few occasions I've read a newspaper it seems about 75%!o(MISSING)f the newspaper coverage has related to it too. A pattern soon emerges after you've read the first few pages though, and it quickly becomes evident that everything in the press is very pro-government. Or it is perhaps fairer to say that it is purely reportage of what the governing parties and politicians have said - it entirely avoids any attempt at commentary or analysis - not even a hint of critical challenge or any genuine comparison of the candidates and pledges. I thought this might just be the style of the papers I was reading, until I turned to the business section and read some fairly good stuff, so it seems it may be more a problem expressing opinion about politics.

So anyway it makes a healthy change to read this article in the UK press,

From what I can gather it's a certainty that Barisan Nasional will be returned to power again - a coalition of about 10 political parties, led by 3 main race-based parties (Malay, Chinese and Indians). This coalition (and an earlier Alliance coalition) has governed Malaysia uninterrupted in the 50 years since independence, and they had about 90%!o(MISSING)f the seats in the last parliament.

So there's probably not much suspense about the outcome today, but who knows. They seem to be using the phrase "Malaysia Decides" (hopefully not admiringly copied from Big Brother)...).

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Comments

[Jennifer Yellow Hat]

*****update*****
Barisan Nasional still have the overall majority (predictably). But this time the opposition won just over a third of seats. Seems it is typically areas in the west of the Peninsular which are more traditionally BN/ more prosperous and advanced areas that have voted in the opposition parties. There were absolute landslides in some places - including Penang and KL itself (all but 1 seat went to the opposition). My taxi driver this morning was very excited telling me about it!