Khairy: Use brains, not brawn, to win young voters

Khairy said old tactics of intimidation no longer worked with today’s voters.

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 20 — Umno Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin has warned that the ruling party’s reliance on executive power to cow political dissent will only serve to drive away young voters, who are capable of telling rhetoric from “genuine service”.

He said the party’s old tack of “using force” — lodging police reports, arresting and demonstrating against those who held different political beliefs — was an anathema to today’s Internet-savvy youths, who demanded open debate above all else.

“The current political sphere is no longer entirely about the struggle for power, but a competition of minds, a battle of ideas,” Khairy told some 800 Umno Youth delegates today in his policy speech.

“Like it or not, those who challenge our political ideology must be defeated through the sharpness of our intellect and the superiority of our arguments, not by relying on executive power.”

Hammering home his point that the battle for the minds of Malaysian youths had to be won by ideas and not force, the Rembau MP added that arrests did nothing to quell a dissenting thought and might even serve to propagate it.

“We might be able to arrest one or two, but what of the hundreds or thousands of their supporters? In the end, disaster may befall us for in our obsession with winning the battle, we may just end up losing the war,” he said.

Echoing the Najib administration’s line that the era of “government knows best” has ended, Khairy said the traditional top-down approach had to give way to an inclusive culture that allowed youths the engage directly in nation-building.

He said it was critical for Umno to start this process of engagement with young voters — the majority of whom were fence-sitters — as they will account for 49 per cent of all votes in the next general election.

In line with this call, the Umno Youth chief proposed that the University and University Colleges Act 1971 (UUCA), which bans university students from participating in political activities even off-campus, be amended to allow students to be actively involved in politics.

“What is the point of us trumpeting that young people are important assets and future leaders if their wish to involve themselves politics is denied and met with scorn?” he said.

“Umno Youth does not only wish to give adequate space for the best minds to contribute through politics, but more than that, we want to acknowledge and elevate this group who are most definitely looking to us for leadership.”