Shamsul Amri Baharuddin, director of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia’s Institute of Ethnic Studies, said many pollsters had not factored in the “moral constituency” among Malays when presenting their results or making forecasts on the election outcome.
“Pollsters and analysts might have left out the ‘moral constituency’ factor, simply because these are the Malays who are not the noisy, complaining lot. This group of people will only appear in massive numbers at PAS public rallies or when they supported Bersih in the past,” Shamsul told FMT.
Shamsul said the “moral constituency” can be divided into three groups – PAS hardcore members, PAS sympathisers and those who view secular parties as “unclean”.
* Hardcore PAS members – not as huge in number as Umno, hence the prediction that PAS could only win seven parliamentary seats.
* PAS sympathisers – not registered members; young urban middle-class professionals with no interest in politics, mostly science-based educated (academicians, doctors, engineers, IT professionals), will vote for PAS.
“Some are young rural graduates of agama (religious) schools, or religious schools in western countries, Middle East, India and Indonesia.
They live in a comfortable middle-class segment, with some even owning Islamic schools, colleges and even kindergartens.
“This group also comprises Muslim-preneurs, such as owners of small-medium enterprises, selling Islamic products including aphrodisiacs (tongkat ali and kacip fatimah) and muslimah attire.
“It’s a quiet circle. But they have money to donate to PAS. In fact, it is reported that a PAS Youth division in Kedah makes money from running Taski, an Islamic kindergarten.”
* those who reject the “unclean” BN and PH – a large circle of pious people whose final objective in life is simply to obtain ‘spiritual nirvana’ or ‘masuk syurga’ in the afterlife; to them, BN and PH are unclean, while PAS is the safe spiritual choice.
“You find them at morning prayers listening to lectures by various speakers. They are also avid listeners to dakwah talks by proselytiser speakers, highly-paid whose fees are raised from donations or collections at the door. “They do this to learn how to cleanse themselves from all the past sins and prepare for the afterlife. Going for umrah is a favourite activity. They have money.”