SHAH ALAM, 1 May: Three Wacana Sinar (discourse) panellist concurred that the Pakatan Rakyat Manifesto is better and is able to meet the expectations of the people compared to the manifesto issued by BN in the election campaign this time.
According to the Head of Ethnicity Cluster and Employment from the Institute of Ethnic Studies (Kita), Prof Dr Mandor Mohd Norr the ideas translated in the Pakatan manifesto is adapted from the people’s feedback.
“PR hears it from the people, so they insert it. For BN, it comes from above, from the ones in power to carry out big projects that does not meet the needs of the people,” said Dr Mansor.
Meanwhile, Assoc Prof Dr Shaharuddin Badaruddin explained the results of the study conducted by the University of Malaya Centre for Democracy and Election Studies (Umcedel) recently also signifies the opinion.
The member of the Umcedel Research Fellow, said that the study found that 42 percent of 1,407 respondents agreed with the Pakatan manifesto.
While 36 percent agreed with the BN manifesto and 22 percent are uncertain.
“What is need by the people is what drives PR to submit its manifesto,” said Dr Shaharuddin who is also a lecturer at the MARA University of Technology’s UiTM) Faculty of Administration and Policy Studies.
Meanwhile the lecturer of the Department of Islamic Revealed Knowledge and Human Sciences from the International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM), Dr Maszlee Malik said that the manifesto drafted by BN is based on the capitalist ideology.
“BN is more towards capitalist cronyism, BN has ideas only to stay in power, that is all,” he said.
Dr. Maszlee added that the BN manifesto titled ‘Fulfilling Promises, Carrying Hope’ is not only said to copy several policies championed by Pakatan, but it uses a title that plagiarised the PR manifesto title.
The 19th series of Wacana Sinar which was held at the Karangkraf Auditorium was conducted by the Chief Executive of the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (Ideas), Wan Saiful Wan Jan.