Clutching her payslip for the previous month in her right hand and a paring knife in her left, S Letchumi rants about how tough life is on the estate where she has lived for 25 years. She points at the RM217 take-home pay printed on her payslip, agonising over her family's monthly trials with three children in secondary school and two sets of sickly parents to care for, not to mention putting food on the table."We have supported Barisan (Nasional) for so long. Every time they come here they tell us to vote for them, they promise they will help us. But after they win, they never show their faces here until they need our votes again," she said, absent-mindedly brandishing her knife.
Letchumi, 42, and a group of women in Ladang Kerling were getting ready to cook food brought in by Puteri Umno in time for a 4pm gathering scheduled at their temple on Monday. Mariamah Subramaniam, 39 and a single mother of four, said the workers don't mind the "gifts" that political parties normally bring while campaigning, but that they would much rather have a concrete solution to their poverty.
"It's nice. PKR gave us some help with rice and some money for our children's bus fare, but they can't just give this year and stop giving after that. Of course it's better than nothing... BN didn't give us a single thing when they came," she said, bouncing her nine-month-old daughter on her hip. Depending on the weather, estate workers say they can earn as much as RM890 in a good month or as low as RM100 when the rains come.
Second-generation estate retiree Ragaraman Kolican, 58, is still poor after tapping rubber for 29 years, and not for lack of trying.
"I was born here. I grew up here. I continued to work the estate after my father died, but with my earnings being so low, I can't afford to buy anything, not a house, not land.
"This whole area was 100 percent BN for a long time. In the past, even if you say you will cut our throats, we would still vote BN. But the BN politicians never keep their promises.
“Palanivel held the seat for so long and every election he told us he will listen to all our problems after he wins, but he never came," he said, referring to former four-term Hulu Selangor parliamentarian G Palanivel, who lost the seat to PKR in 2008.
No love for MIC
Thirumurthy Appalanaidu, 48, admitted that the estate workers know little of BN candidate P Kamalanathan but stressed that they have already made up their minds.
"We are not angry with (premier) Najib (Abdul Razak), but we know very well that MIC has not done anything for us.
"We read the news, we know that Najib announced (allocations of) millions (of ringgit) to help the poor but when the money reaches MIC it does not go down to the people.”
Thirumurthy added that PKR has done more for them over the last two years than the BN has over the decades that it held Hulu Selangor.
"If BN had helped us we can vote for them, but without helping us how do we vote for them?" he asked.
Even if such views come from only a section of the Indian electorate, it seems to correlate with PKR's optimism that it can win a substantial number of votes come polling day on Sunday. Indians comprise 12,453 (or 19.3 percent) of the 64,500 registered voters in Hulu Selangor.
PKR Kapar MP S Manikavasagam claimed that the party has been getting a much better turnout of Indians at daily campaign activities compared to previous elections.
"We feel we will get good support. We're expecting between 55-60 percent of the Indian vote, maybe even more," he added, pointing out that poverty and land issues are the main grouses of the community in Hulu Selangor.- Joseph Sipalan
source:malaysiakini
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