PM claims BN spent for people, not votes

By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani - The Malaysian Insider,

PUTRAJAYA, April 26 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak acknowledged today his administration approved millions of ringgit in projects for Hulu Selangor, but denied that it was meant to buy the votes which secured Barisan Nasional (BN) a victory in yesterday's by-elections.
He said the projects were meant to solve the problems of voters in the constituency and not to buy their votes.
The prime minister was responding to a question at a press conference today where he was asked if BN's expenditure of "RM167 million," was considered vote buying.
The RM167 million figure was based on a report in Chinese-language daily Oriental Daily. The Malaysian Insider has separately estimated that BN had pledged and arranged for more than RM70 million in donations, projects and other aid for voters during the campaign.
Today, the BN chairman dismissed accusations by Pakatan Rakyat (PR) that BN had engaged in pork barrelled spending to "buy" the Hulu Selangor by-election.
Najib said today that BN did not buy votes but instead addressed the problems facing the residents of the constituents.
“We do not buy votes but solve the people’s problem. These are genuine problems which have not been addressed for some time.
“It is not like we went around and said that we will give this, no. It was on a basis that the people wanted these projects. These are genuine needs of the people, we are not buying votes,” he told reporters after attending the Malaysia Green Forum 2010 here.
The PM acknowledged BN had spent money but did not mention the amount used during the by-election campaign.
PR has claimed that their defeat was due to BN's deep coffers and that Najib was willing to dole out at least RM64million to entice voters during the by-election campaign.
Najib, however, accused PR of being hypocritical in its allegations.
“They should also ask themselves what they have done with the state government’s resources. Haven’t they been approving all kinds of things for the people during elections? They have been doing that so don’t point their fingers at Barisan Nasional. Please look at themselves,” he said.
MIC’s P. Kamalanathan won the hard-fought Hulu Selangor by-election in what will be seen as a boost for Najib’s administration, but failed to convincingly bury a strong PR.
The BN candidate received 24,997 votes to defeat PKR’s Datuk Zaid Ibrahim, who got 23,272 votes. There were 731 spoilt votes, of the total of 48,935 votes cast. Voter turnout was 75.87 per cent. Both coalitions improved on their performance but BN took in 2,000 more votes this time, against Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) 200 extra votes.
Although the by-election was billed as a referendum on the government, Najib believes the “ultimate test” will be in the next national polls.
“The ultimate test will be the general elections. So far from what I have heard, I am very encouraged that there is an underlying support amongst the public. We hope to show more results and the people want to see the results.
We are committed to ensure that our execution and implementations will be showing the way in terms of delivering the results and what the people would like us to do,” he said.
Najib was delighted that BN was able to capture a seat in a state that they were considered as “handicapped.”
“I am happy with the results because it shows the trend is definitely moving towards Barisan Nasional. It is a good victory because we were fighting a battle in a state controlled by the opposition.
We were handicapped that sense. However the victory is a good victory because we can build on this victory and it has given our Barisan Nasional a lot of new spirit and hope for the future,” he said.
He added that BN’s victory must be a “sustainable victory.”
“It has to be a sustainable victory and we have will sustain our victory by understanding what needs to be done for the long haul so it cannot just be a one off victory but build on it and strengthened what needs to be done so that Barisan Nasional becomes the party for the future as well,” he said.
However Najib refused to comment on the governing coalition’s failure to recapture support from the Chinese community.
BN was only able to garner 28 per cent of the Chinese vote in Hulu Selangor yesterday, down from 37 per cent in Election 2008.