In the Bukit Gantang by-election, victor Mohd Nizar Jamaluddin garnered 21,860 votes against IsmailSaffian’s 19,071. Independent Kamarul Ramizu only managed to secure 62 votes and lost his deposit.

Although Nizar won with an increase majority of 2,789, votes there are still 19,701 voters that Pakatan Rakyat needs to pay attention about.

What went wrong with this other 19,701? With PAS openly admitting that they received less Malay votes (43%) compared to 47% in the last general election, this phenomenon is indeed puzzling and a study needs to be conducted immediately to understand the reasons.

On the positive side, the Chinese votes for Pakatan increased by 10%, but PR can’t afford to ignore the other 48% voters who voted for BN. So the questions here is, what were the main issues affecting the19,701 voters to think that BN is still better than PR?

1. Did the 19,701 voters actually believe that the takeover of Perak by BN was legal? Or did they really think that Nizar and Pakatan had committed treason against the Sultan?

And did they find the testimonies of the three ‘frogs’ that ‘Nizar is controlled by DAP’ believable?

2. Did the 19,701 voters actually vote for BN because they feel rejuvenated with Najib Abdul Razak as prime minister?

3. How many of the 19,701 voters made an informed vote based either on the Internet media or the mainstream media? Were they able to receive enough information to make the right judgment? Or they were relying on feed from the wrong source of information?

4. With the decrease in Malay votes, Pakatan has to conduct a study to see why the race card played by BN was effective in the rural areas.

Besides that, Pakatan has to reexamine the Malay vote in terms of age and gauge whether voters of certain age brackets voted BN because of tradition or any other reason.

5. Do these voters know what democracy is really about? How can Pakatan reach them with the correct information in preparation for the next general election?

6. How many out of 19,701 voters are actually BN members? Pakatan should focus on those who are not BN members and do a postmortem on why they voted for BN.

7. How many out of 19,701 voters actually voted for BN because they are anti-DAP, anti-PAS or anti-PKR? Are there any leaders in Pakatan that caused the voters to swing to BN?

8. How important is the poverty factor affecting the poor’s voting pattern? A study should be conducted on voters based on their economic background. How does the voting pattern differ between the poor, middle class and the rich?

9. How big is the impact the blogging community had on these 19,701 voters? Remember there are both pro-Pakatan and pro-BN bloggers running on the Internet.

10. Last but not least, was it because of the rowdy attitude of some Pakatan supporters (causing traffic jams, shouting, jeering etc) during campaigning that drove a portion out of the 19,701 to vote for BN as a sign of anger or protest?

Pakatan Rakyat should not get too carried away with this victory. There’s still a lot of work that needs to be done to woo the other 48% voters who still think BN is better than Pakatan.

Every opinion from the rakyat matters. Do not take lightly this 48% voters; go down to the ground and talk to them to see what their concerns are and why they voted in such a way.

Yes, we can’t win 100% of the votes, but there is no harm in finding out what the other side is complaining about.

The answers to be above questions can be extremely beneficial and it may hold the key for Pakatan to win the next general election more convincingly.