UMNO Not Sulking After 40 Years, Demands Tenggaroh Seat

After a 40-year wait and sacrifices for Barisan Nasional's (BN) solidarity, UMNO's aspiration to contest the Tenggaroh state seat in the Johor elections has finally materialized.

BN Johor Chairman Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi acknowledged that the demand for UMNO to field a candidate in this traditional MIC seat was not easy. It required significant sacrifices in other areas to uphold the principle of power-sharing among component parties. Ghazi noted that while MIC had contested DUN Tenggaroh for 40 consecutive years, the UMNO machinery never isolated itself or sulked during election seasons.

"For 40 years, UMNO has asked for this seat (DUN Tenggaroh), is that true? And every election when we didn't get it, UMNO never sulked, always fought for BN, and DUN Tenggaroh never lost, right?" Ghazi stated at a gathering with Mersing BN machinery. "We remained loyal to the struggle. That's why I thank the machinery at the DUN Tenggaroh level. Friends from MIC, don't be upset. Here, in the DUN Tenggaroh area, there are 500 Indian voters out of 38,000 voters. So, this is not a racial issue."

Ghazi emphasized the concept of power-sharing within BN. "We are in the spirit of BN, there is the concept of power-sharing. When Tenggaroh pleaded with me, I couldn't bear to refuse. In the spirit of power-sharing, when we bring out one component party, we have to place that component party in another seat," he explained.

Ghazi added that DUN Tenggaroh was previously won with a majority of around 1,300 votes. With UMNO's return after 40 years, this figure must be doubled. "If we won with a majority of 1,300 before, will we only win by 1,300 this time? Let's double it, can we? Our target now is not just to win, but to win with a majority of 3,000 votes after this," he declared.