DAP may have won the battle, but has it lost the war after its landmark central executive committee (CEC) triennial party elections when its most senior leader Lim Guan Eng was nearly ousted from the leadership committee?
Lim only managed to place 26th out of the 30 elected slots available in the CEC after last Sunday’s elections.
While both critics and well-wishers remained divided on whether Lim had in reality won or lost, the fact that he had relinquished the party chairmanship after just one term, is frankly a tremor within the socialist party.
Whether it emerges later as a tsunami or an earthquake, it remains to be seen as Lim was appointed as an advisor, which some quarters depict as a “face saving” move.
Would Lim lose his famous loud voice after this stunning plunge in DAP’s popularity rank from eighth to 26 in under five years?
As dust settles and the cleaners remove the furnishing at the IDCC Ideal Convention Centre in Selangor, there are two takeaways emerging from the CEC.
One, which many party insiders have expressed in private, is the inability of Penang DAP to close ranks, with many fingers pointed at Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow and his expected successor Steven Sim Chee Keong, together with Lim, for this imbroglio.
All three are not on the same page despite operating out of the same state.
There is no Penang leader featured in the top ten for the first time. Sim, the Human Resources Minister, took 11th place although new DAP chairman Gobind Singh Deo, who finished first, was originally from Penang.
But Gobind has shifted his political base to Selangor.
Chow took the 19th rank, which is nothing to gloat about for a sitting Chief Minister.
This is worrisome as Penang is the crown jewel state of DAP, said observer Jeff Ooi, who served as the party’s Jelutong MP from 2008 to 2018.
Ooi said that it remains to be seen if Sim, Chow and Lim can close ranks with their respective factions.
This CEC is supposed to prepare the ground ahead of the next general election, but it shows that DAP may reflect unity on the surface but underground or undersea, as Penang is surrounded by one, is bubbling with a possible tsunami.
The last “political tsunami” happened in 2008 when Gerakan was swept away from power by the strong waves generated by DAP.
In part, DAP was helped by Gerakan’s infighting.
Sounds familiar?
Now some 17 years later, DAP may be facing a similar fate but there is a doubt that it might be a tsunami for the lack of alternatives among the voters to choose from.
Instead, DAP may end up losing seats, but it may very well herald the start of the demise of a political party, as Penang voters have been notoriously famous for.
The minute they sense that their leaders are mediocre, and are not serving them well, out they go.
Just ask Gerakan, who was whitewashed despite bringing much development to Penang.
The second takeaway from the CEC, is the lack of DAP representation from Federal Territory (FT), another power base of the party.
Outspoken folks such as Seputeh Mp Teresa Kok and her Kepong counterpart Lim Lip Eng, did not make it into the CEC, leaving only Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh, the Segambut MP, as the sole FT representative among the 30 elected CEC members.
Already veterans such as Cheras MP Tan Kok Wai and Bukit Bintang MP Fong Kui Lun have decided to retire from politics and would be vacating their parliamentary seats when the time is up.
Time is now on the side of the new and younger as well as fresher CEC members, especially with new positions created for them to expound on.
But time may also not be on their side, as they have to grapple with, in Loke’s own words, no “feel-good” factor yet in the eyes and minds of the voters.
Come every five years, the voters, especially those for DAP, would like to show who is the boss.
Would they be satisfied with the DAP as their employees after some five years of in government?
This is especially with Lim’s words that DAP is only a “yes-man” to the people and no one else. – March 18, 2025