JOHOR BARU – Amid the spat over seats in Johor, state PKR Youth chief Yuneswaran Ramaraj has questioned why youth-led Muda is taking on urban constituencies but not rural ones.
In a brief statement on his Facebook page, he asked if Muda only wants to be the voice of urbanites and seemingly ignoring rural voters.
“I attended a meeting with leaders in the state chapter a few weeks ago, subsequently offering Muda three seats. But Muda rejected all three and asked for another three.
“We are open to reconsidering if Muda rejected one or two seats, but it did not want constituencies with a Malay majority or those in rural areas.
“Why does Muda refuse to run in constituencies with more than 78% Malay voters? Is Muda afraid that Malay voters will reject them in the Johor election?”
He said if Muda is sincere to be the voice of the people, its leaders should prove that they have support from all segments, be it rural or urban voters.
“Sri Medan will be among the 20 seats that PKR will be contesting in. Its voter composition is 90.6% Malays, 8.6% Chinese and 0.3% Indians. Sri Medan has the most Malay voters among the 20 seats.
“This is what we call a ‘gentleman fight’.”
This morning Muda warned that it will not hesitate to clash with PKR, giving the Pakatan Harapan component party until this weekend to back down from contesting in 20 constituencies as announced.
The youth-led party, in facing its inaugural election, said it has held several official talks with PKR leadership but yet the party ended negotiations when it decided to contest in 20 seats.
The spat worsened after Johor PKR women’s chief Napsiah Khamis Maharan criticised Muda’s decision to contest in Puteri Wangsa after the former’s machinery had worked hard to regain the people’s trust.
She said the seat was given to Amanah to contest but questioned the rationale in then giving way to Muda.
Last Wednesday, Syed Ibrahim said the party has already offered three seats to Muda, but the latter claimed PKR has yet to finalise its offer.
Earlier, Amanah and DAP had already agreed to offer Muda a total of six seats to contest, namely Tenang, Bukit Kepong, Parit Raja, Machap, Puteri Wangsa and Bukit Permai. – The Vibes, February 18, 2022
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