Arif Shah, 52, a two-term BN state representative speaks fluent Mandarin, - an advantage obviously seen by the BN as a move to win back back the Chinese voters.
Deputy Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak made the announcement last night after launching BN's election machinery in Seberang Jaya, which is among the three state seats under the Permatang Pauh parliamentary constituency
Najib, who is also the Umno deputy president and BN deputy head, introduced its candidate to about 1,500 BN leaders and supporters, reports malaysiakini.
Extracts from Malaysiakini below:
By-election: Arif Shah is BN's choice
Najib later told reporters that Arif Shah was picked because he had successfully defended the Seberang Jaya seat in the last general election, which was an exception when almost all other Umno/BN candidates had tumbled.
The Seberang Jaya state constituency is one of three state seats under Permatang Pauh. The other two - Permatang Pasir and Penanti - are presently held by PAS and PKR respectively.
On the rare BN practice to select a standing state representative to contest for a by-election, Najib said "this is not a BN tradition but there is nothing to stop us from making this decision as it is not against (BN) constitution".
"There are a few opposition leaders who also contested on both parliamentary and state seats in the last general election," he said.
As for the candidate himself, Arif Shah said that he was confident of wrestling the seat away from PKR. He however added that he might not be able to do so with an overwhelming majority.
"Anwar may be good in one thing but not everything. People need a service-oriented MP," he added.
The seat fell vacant after its incumbent Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail vacated it on July 31 to allow her husband Anwar to contest as a way back to the Parliament.
Nomination is on Aug 16, coming Saturday.
Arif Shah was among the front-runner to be chosen by Umno to run for this by-election. The other favourite candidate was party state treasurer and former deputy minister of rural development Zainal Abidin Osman.
Local residents told Malaysiakini that Arif Shah had "multiracial and youthful appeal" and was "well-liked beyond communal boundaries, are enterprising and untainted clean personality".
Arif Shah's ace in the sleeve is that, he is familiar with Anwar's political style, having served as Permatang Pauh Youth chief when Anwar headed the Umno division there.
The are 58,459 voters - of which 490 are postal voters - as of July 31 at this constituency. - Malaysiakini
15 comments:
The man survived by a whisker. Only 533 vote majority in March 08. You think speaking Chinese works with an UMNO mind today? Note that when he got 533 majority, (of which 400 were postal votes), many Chinese and Indians were apprehensive of Anwar by then and voted BN. Majority of the Malays did vote against him and that worsened over the last few months as anger against BN sky rocketed over multifarious issues. Moreover, today the case is very much different. A sane Chinese and a sane Indian is not ready under any circumstance whatsoever to vote for an AMNO man. Telling the Chinese and Indians to leave the country and saying AMNO chose someone who speaks their languages is a tragic irony that shows their buffoonery.
This by-election is going to be a closely watched by many. We expect a a fair & clean election.
Hope th Be End wont play dirty.
Certainly Dato Ariff Shah and UMNO is the underdog this time and unlike always.
UMNO may not win at Permatang Pauh but heck!who knows,right?.there's always possibilty for suprises in politics.
if we want to talk about racial issue,then it seems the talk is going to be like a neverending one.there's always someone in somewhere wanted to open their mouth regarding racial issue.remember as well that there are also non-malays in BN.
I read over at Malaysia Today, Arif Shah is the brother of Amin Shah who "duped" the Malaysian Navy's 14 billion dollar contract for building submarines.
Till today none is built. Two that were built arent working.
So what the big fuss here if this old UMNO man can speak Chinese... Just language only... Too bad he is in the sinking ship...
With Chinese language speaking, can we expect him able to balik Cina??? hahaha...
BN UMNO is using all the racial cards they can for this by election... well, no surprise if they lost again... for all the silly incidents they plotted this couple weeks... and full use of all their dirty play in this by election...
Penang Chinese and Indian ethics are no longer stupid... and can be fool by BN UMNO...
Another MAMAK gaining political power!
if he can speak chinese he can dupe the chinese......
but he will be accepted as a chinese ONLY if he is hurt when referred to as BABI
We the Malays of Permatang Pauh demand a clear stad from DSAI about UiTM. Please sya it in a very straight forward language Yes or No to open UiTM to non-Malays. We'll mobilised all the UiTM students in Permatang Pauh to all Anwar's rally and political campaign to demand his stand. Beware.
Re: Anon 1.43 pm
There's nothing wrong with allocating 10% UiTM to non-Bumis. 90% intakes still Bumis. Tan Sri Khalid's intention was to prepare students to face the real world, i.e. working together in multi-cultural setting and trust building across the ethnic divide.
In the long run, if we are open-minded we gain more than we lose.
Fauziah's blog featured Tan Sri Arshad Ayub. He wants Malays to be progressive and keep with the time by enforcing English. In the true sense of the word, he is an educationist of a high order.
Tan Sri Arshad could easily be a linguist champ of the Malays. But his vision was far and wide beyond ethno-centric.
BN is very smart to put him as the chosen candidate to fight against ANWAR. No doubt that he would be a tough opponent for ANWAR in the coming election. He himself is from a local state people, and he fits the criteria to be MP since he is a hardworking person with the addition of his popularity among the local people in permatang pauh and seberang prai.
anon 10:38AM
This is from Din Merican's blog:
"Ariff Shah is the brother of Tan Sri Amin Shah Omar Shah who is in now in self-imposed exile in the UK. He shuttles between London and Dubai but would never dare come close to Malaysia because there are criminal breaches of trust (CBT) allegations he may have to answer to.
In case you have forgotten, Amin Shah’s company, PSC Industries Berhad, was awarded more than RM24 billion in naval contracts around 1998 at the time Deputy Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak was already the Defence Minister.
The government paid him billions in upfront money but Amin Shah’s company never fulfilled its side of the bargain.
Billions of Ringgit of Malaysian taxpayers’ money went down the drain in the biggest fraud in Malaysian history.
Amin Shah’s brother, Azlan Shah Omar Shah, was the Managing Director of the company. And now yet another brother, Ariff Shah, wishes to represent the voters of Permatang Pauh as its next Member of Parliament.
here's the link:
http://dinmerican.wordpress.com/2008/08/14/return-of-amin-shah-via-ariff-shah-in-permatang-pauh-dirty-umno-politics/
tok mommy,
i know this guy Arif Shah, though not personally.
he's ok. i don't know whther he's the best that Umno has got. It shows, doesn't it, hat Umno has a dearth of good qualified and popular leaders.
tok mommy, is MRT for all bloggers? Must we be a known/named blogger?
cheers!
http://educationmalaysia.blogspot.com/2008/08/fake-degree-in-permatang-pauh.html
Fake Degree in Permatang Pauh?
Thanks Sree for pointing this out to me. Disclaimer first: I am not commenting on the record of political service of the BN candidate in the upcoming by election in Permatang Pauh - Arif Shah Oman Shah. I am merely pointing out his academic credentials, which were listed in the Star recently. It says that he has a Diploma in Civil Engineering (no university / college given) and that he's currently pursuing a PhD at the Edison University of Technology (off campus program).
Sree pointed out to me that there is not such institution as the Edison University of Technology. To give the YB the benefit of the doubt, it is very possible that the Star might have misquoted his education credentials. I knew a reporter who's a good friend who misheard Lim Si Pin, the Deputy Youth Chief of GERAKAN, and thought that he had double degrees from YALE while in fact, Si Pin had graduated from WALES.
So could it be possible that YB Arif Shah Oman Shah was pursuing a PhD at the Thomas Edison State College? Perhaps. Only problem is that this college does not offer than PhD programs whether it is in house or off campus. It only offers Masters level programs are none of them are Engineering programs which I assume is the PhD which the YB should be pursuing given his background.
Perhaps he's referring to Edison College, a small college in Florida? Could be but the only problem with that theory is that this is an undergraduate only institution. Nothing about PhDs or distance learning programs on its website.
Could he be referring to the Edison Welding Institute?
Maybe he decided to branch out of engineering and go into biotechnology and is doing a PhD with the Edison Institute of Biotechnology at the Ohio University?
This is the only reference I could find on the Edison Institute of Technology and it brings you to a rare book website selling a book that is signed by Thomas Edison and is selling for US2,500.
Maybe the YB actually didn't say Edison. Maybe he said Madison Institute of Cosmetology instead of the Edison Institute of Technology?
Or perhaps he was talking about the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) or maybe the California Institute of Technology (Caltech)?
Or it could have been the Mara Institute of Technology? Except that it is called UiTM now or University Teknologi Mara?
Let's hope that he's not referring to Edison University, apparently operated by the wife of Thomas James Kirk who is in prison for creating diploma mills.
My sense of the matter is this. Because of the immense competition that takes place in the context of UMNO politics, having a degree is becoming much more important than before. He probably felt the pressure of having only a Diploma and wanted to advance his academic credentials. Instead of doing a proper degree at the Bachelor's level or even an MBA from one of the local colleges (which does not require one to have a Bachelor's), he was probably thinking, why not go all out? Why not go for a PhD instead? And since there's no way that a full time politician has the time to do a PhD, why not take the shortcut and get a fake PhD? I'm not sure how he came across Edison University but it could have been one of the places which was promoting itself as a destination for obtaining fake PhDs. He might have enrolled in the course sometime back but then didn't follow up on the procedures to obtain this PhD. When the reporter asked him about his academic qualifications, he might have forgotten the exact name of the university and blurted out Edison Institute of Technology given that it was probably an engineering PhD he was pursuing.
I'll see if any of the editors of the online newspapers will bite on this. Thanks again Sree.
Hi witch,
"It shows, doesn't it, hat Umno has a dearth of good qualified and popular leaders.
It does seem so, doesnt it?
About te mrt: If you like to join us for MRT, you are more than welcome. This is my e-mail:
mariasamad@yahoo.com
I'll give you my address and h/p no.
Saya harap pilihan UMNO adalah tepat dan boleh membawa kepada kemenangan kepada UMNO walaupun saya tidak mengenali beliau sebelum ini. Saya yakin UMNO memilih beliau atas faktor-faktor yang kuat. Kalau tak menang pun, sekurang-kurangnya perbezaan undi biarlah sedikit yang mana menunjukkan bahawa pertarungan adalah sengit. Apa yang saya dapat tau, beliau adalah seorang yang sangat dikenali oleh rakyat Permatang Pauh sebagai orang yang mempunyai peribadi yang positif dan berwibawa... Teruskan perjuanganmu Dato' Arif Shah...
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