The Silent Majority

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Quick question: Which of the following group is largest in number?

A) The National Front (BN) supporter
B) The Pact Of Hope (PH) supporter
C) The PAN Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) supporter
D) All of the above
E) None of the above

NONE of the Above

No matter how many times PH claims that they had won the popular vote of the last general election on 5th May 2015, they never really did it, technically. In fact, BN had only defeat these group of people ONE TIME in the past 8 elections, in the span of over 30 years.

Ladies and gentlemen, baby and elephants, meet the Silent Majority: Those that refuse to vote.

Choices

Voting Age Population (VAP) is a concept in Political Science, that refers to the group of individuals that have reached the minimum voting age to participate in political votings. VAP often used in the calculation of voter turnout in elections.

Image Credit: Geralt/Pixababy.com

For the past 35 years, Malaysia’s General Election VAP turnout rate is around 58%. In other words, those that did not vote, for any reason, accounts around 41% of all eligible voters.

In 2013, there is 17.8 million eligible voter, 13.2 million (62.95%) of them actually registered and 11.2 million (84.4%) of them cast their vote. PH garnered 5.6 million votes, a quick math tell us that it is just mered 31.44% compared to VAP. In other word, there is 6.6 million people that didn’t not vote at all.

They choose to not choose at all, but do they realized that they also giving away the right to change all together?

Voting and Democracy

It is true that voting do not translate to democracy, and it’s also true that by voting alone will not get us to true democratic society, yet many had failed to understand the importance of voting. Democracy is all about options and the people choose using their votes. Thus saying that voting is the cornerstone of a democracy is not a exaggeration at all. By not voting, voters voluntarily relinquish their right to choice without bothering with the consequences.

Image Credit: Geralt/Pixababy.com

Changes only come after you made a choice.
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Yes I do understand many will come up with the argument about “Bad apple on the both side” and why should they bother. Sadly, I have no other argument to refute that claim, but only to ask you to vote, and hopefully through choices we made we will able to make a breakthrough. Yes this will take a long time, and we might never see that day coming, but please remember that our children and grandchildren will then enjoy the fruit of our struggle.

Image Credit: Geralt/Pixababy.com

If any of you reading this that have yet ever to cast your first vote even you are eligible to vote for many, many years, I am sincerely asking you to reconsider your decision, and ask yourself, do you hope for a change in your life?

FYI

Here in Malaysia, the voting age is 21 years old and compulsory voting is not enforced. All Malaysian wishes to vote is required by law to register themselves with Election Commission of Malaysia. Registration can be made in EC offices and computerised POS offices throughout Malaysia.

Those registered can check their registration status at here.
Source: International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance
Inspired by: Ah Lye