Johor stories and Azmin's safe seat

I was watching a classy British gangster movie yesterday when an old friend called.

The guy was one of my teammates when I was operating out of Johor.

Unlike me, he's still running around in the local political circle there.

We talked about the coming Johor election and he asked me a thing or two as he still think I have a good insight of politics in the state.

I reminded him that I have left Johor for almost 10 years and only visited my home state once in a while since then.

So, I'm not the best source of information anymore for Johor politics. In fact, I told him that being still on the ground there definitely makes him having better knowledge of it than me.

Nonetheless, he insisted to know my opinion as I do still keep in touch with some of the main Johor political seniors and players.

I told him what I know and it turns out that his prediction of a BN victory in the coming state election was even more optimistic than mine.

He said at most, Pakatan could only win 14 of the 56 seats while my prediction was 18.

And my friend is a Chinese.

He told me that Johor DAP, which is the only BN opponent in the state with a real machinery was in a mess due to infightings and it may even lose one or two of its strongholds.

"Cina pun dah menyampah. Dia orang ramai yang malas nak mengundi," he said.

He said the only real problem faced by BN was the pressure put on its Johor chief Hasni by certain quarters in Umno to put undesirable candidates.

One example was in Kempas where some Umno gang was trying to replace the main guy there Ramli Buhanie with a parachute candidate.

I was glad when he told me that Jazlan, as the division chief in Pulai which Kempas is part of, is backing Ramli. I know Ramli and he's a good guy.

Hopefully Hasni will listen to Jazlan on that one and stand his ground and not let outsiders, no matter how powerful, meddle with Johor Umno affairs.

Otherwise he will be another lame duck MB like Khaled Nordin.

Anyway, my friend told me something really funny that happened the other day.

He said Azmin Ali was down there meeting his supporters and it turned out that he was also checking whether he could get himself a safe parliament seat to contest in Johor in the next general election.

The guy must be so desperate, if what my friend told me is the truth.

There's no way he could find such a seat in Johor.

In fact there are nobody who is an anti-Umno Malay who could find a safe seat to contest in that state at the moment, unless maybe if he/she tries to contest on DAP ticket in one of the party's strongholds.

Whatever it is, my guess was that Azmin was probably looking for such a seat in other states too.

Well, good luck to him.

Honestly, I believe that the guy will be screwed whichever way he turns now. Everyone is turning their back to him and he can't go anywhere with that. He's just not that type.

This article,

Is Azmin's political career coming to a grinding halt? 

started with this;

excerpts

Once touted as the next future deputy prime minister, Bersatu supreme council member Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali may see his political career come to a standstill.

Ya, I was actually one of those who thought that the guy was even a PM material.

That was until the same sex video scandal.

Even if it's not true, at that time I have to say that the guy was finished.

He may be able to survive homosexual allegations or a proper sex recording but not with a video like that.

He shouldn't have put himself in such a position.

Whoever did that video thing really did him in. Fake or not doesn't really matter as the perception game is clearly against him now.

And I'm quite sure it was not Umno, which was behind it.

Honestly, if I'm Azmin, I would cut my losses and retire from politics.

Why should I let myself be buggered by all the nonsense.

I heard he is already quite well off now, after all.

He should really just migrates and starts a new life with his wonderful family elsewhere. 

San Francisco would be nice, I think. Azmin stands a better chance of finding himself a safe seat there than in Johor. 

Yeah, I would have done that if I have such money and loved ones.