DOES THE PAKATAN RAKYAT STATE GOVERNMENT OF SELANGOR REALLY EXIST?

By Mansor Puteh



Despite all the political drama surrounding the removal of former menteri besar of Selangor, Khalid Ibrahim and the appointment of his successor, Azmin Ali, and the new line of state executive committee members, which had taken up much space in the newspapers and media lately, one wonders if there is really a state government in Selangor all these years since Pakatan Rakyat won the elections in February, 2008 till now.

As a long-time resident of Selangor, I have not felt like there is one. The Pakatan Rakyat state government is just for show; it does not exist in ways that we know it.   

The state is very much ‘governed’ by Barisan Nasional and the apparatus and structures that it had put in place since Merdeka till now. Nothing new was added to them.

Khalid Ibrahim as menteri besar had never been known to make any visits to the constituencies, including his own in Bandar Tun Razak, as did the exco members under his leadership.

He was very much holed in his office and the administration building and attending so few official functions in the state, country or abroad. He was in the news for being embroiled in party politicking most of the time.

And the same will happen with the new menteri besar and his exco members, who are all totally detached from the people living in the state.

I have not heard of anyone writing to them for anything. And they had never been known to show any care to the well-being of the people of the state.

The Pakatan Rakyat government of Selangor only exists because the majority of the voters in Selangor simply wanted to replace those in Barisan Nasional that the coalition party and especially Umno had failed to remove early.

If this had been done by Umno, surely, Selangor would not have gone to Pakatan Rakyat in 2008.

Unfortunately, the voters in Selangor as well as those in the whole country that had voted opposition had this in mind when they went to the polls in 2008, to replace or remove those in Umno and Barisan Nasional who had been there too long and who had not been known to have done much.

They did not consciously vote for the opposition whose candidates in the general elections of 2008 and also 2014 to be people that they wanted to choose, because they had not been known to have served their community. They are mere party supporters who were chosen to run in the election, and fortunately, won.

Yet, given more than six years, none of them and especially the Pakatan Rakyat exco members and also the menteri besar has not been known to go down to the roots, to delve deeper to investigate personally what the state lacks and needs badly.

The few public gatherings that they held were not received well especially their Hari Raya Puasa gatherings that were not so well attended.

They will still survive as long as Umno and Barisan Nasional do not show to the people of Selangor that they can present to them a new line-up of their new generation of leaders who care for the well-being of the people and who do not crave for personal attention shouting empty slogans to get media attention.

Unfortunately, too, the so-called ‘economic advisor’ of Pakatan, Anwar Ibrahim has not done anything to deserve to be given the post.

Since his appointment to the post, what has he brought to the state? How much foreign investment has he managed to bring into the state and what other interesting projects has he also caused to be developed?

How many economists in Selangor and abroad has he met to discuss what else that Selangor today can do in the state and for its people to reap their full potential in all fields and industries? 

Selangor has vast potential that has already been capitalized and developed by the former state government of Barisan Nasional led by Umno, and the present Pakatan Rakyat state government merely extends them, without knowing how to improve on them.

One can then say that Selangor is not led by their political leaders but by the very technocrats and bureaucrats that had been put in place by the former state government, which follows in the same ways and styles of the state governments controlled by Umno and Barisan Nasional.

The Pakatan Rakyat way of dealing with the people and investors does not exist.

Worse, the Pakatan Rakyat state government of Selangor still does not have any five-year plans to develop the state to show to its voters and people that they can do better than the government that they had managed to ‘replace’ in 2008.

In many ways, they had not managed to replace the former state government of Barisan Nasional and Umno, because they did not have alternative development plans for the state that can best take full advantage of the potentials that exist in the state especially in its vast human resources and talents and qualified persons especially since the state has many prominent universities and other centers of higher learning that the other states do not have.

Pakatan Rakyat may have won the support of the majority of the voters of Selangor since 2008, but it has not won over the entire state.

The majority of the voters of Selangor who voted Pakatan Rakyat in 2008 and 2014 did not even know who they were voting for.

And in my area, their candidates are still unknown. They have banners showing their faces which they put up at some junctions and other state buildings to greet people.

But they are not known to have done much. Not many know who they are and what they have done or plan to do for their own constituencies?

In the area of Taming in Balakong, Selangor, the streetlights were dead for many months and drains clogged with rubbish thrown at signboards warning anyone from throwing rubbish.

Selangor is one of the messiest and dirtiest states in the country. It cannot be compared to Melaka where I am originally from, which is clean with the roads leveled and not broken by potholes and disturbed by the many bumps that we can see in the roads in Selangor.

Selangor can be said to be the ‘model state’ for Pakatan Rakyat and Melaka is the model state for Barisan Nasional and Melaka in this regard.  



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