The ghosts that return every election
THERE are two things Malaysians tend to notice when an election draws near – the sudden appearance of posters on every available pole and the re-emergence of promises that seem to have been quietly waiting in a drawer for many moons.
In the coming contest for Johor, some say the political atmosphere already feels a bit uneasy. Not exactly haunted, but let’s just say even the streetlights might be wondering whether they’ve seen this manifesto before.
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There is something about elections that tends to awaken old memories – promises made and forgotten return, along with familiar patterns that recur every few years, only with slight changes in packaging. Consider them “ghosts” – they are known entities.
Recycled slogans and faces that reappear each cycle with variations in tone but familiar assurances. Others are more elusive, often spoken of in more colourful terms by voters.
The notion of phantoms in the system, where questions are occasionally raised about entries, movements or irregularities, seem to appear and disappear without clear explanation.
Ghosts are said to return because they have unfinished business. Politicians, it seems, return for much the same reason.
Whether fact, fear or folklore, they share one basic expectation – that the election process must be beyond doubt.
What voters expect is not complicated – clarity, integrity and a process that inspires full confidence from start to finish. Not only on polling day, but throughout the entire democratic exercise, from campaigning to counting and everything in between.
Ghosts or spirits, according to lore, are creatures of habit. They haunt the same spaces at roughly the same times, doing the same unsettling things.
Politics, on the other hand, can be far more unpredictable. Today’s firm stance can become tomorrow’s flexible interpretation, depending on the wind direction and public sentiment. Politicians? They seem adaptable.
They appear to possess the ability to be in three constituencies before lunch, attend four photo opportunities by teatime and dominate every social media feed before dinner.
Election season also produces miracles worthy of paranormal investigation. Roads that have been riddled with potholes for years suddenly receive much-needed repairs. Parks suddenly acquire fresh coats of paint.
Faulty streetlights find the energy to shine again and long-neglected drains are fixed as though an overly eager poltergeist has awakened from a four-year slumber. If one were to imagine a supernatural guide to elections, it might look something like this. First, the voters – they are not haunted by spirits, but by something more familiar – experience.
They remember roads promised but never paved, wages promised but not raised and reforms still “under study”.
Second, the candidates. During campaigns, even the most reserved personalities seem to undergo a “mystical transformation”.
Babies become irresistibly adorable. Market vegetables suddenly deserve admiration and every cup of teh tarik becomes worthy of a staged photograph.
Jokes aside, candidates should bear in mind that there is a quiet dignity in a fair contest. No need for hauntings or curses, just ideas meeting ideas, policies meeting scrutiny. The best candidates, like well-behaved ghosts, leave a place better than they found it.
They should also remember that the real test begins after the ballots are counted. Because governance is not a seance where promises are summoned for applause and then vanish into the dark. It is closer to daylight work – steady, unglamorous and accountable.
Third, the phantom voters. Every good ghost story has its phantoms, much like every election has its whispers about phantom voters – those elusive figures who appear with impeccable timing before vanishing just as quickly.
Such tales make for lively conversation. But behind the humour lies a simple truth. Voters are not haunted by ghosts or spirits so much as by memory.
Winning an election should require more than theatrics. To the voters – ask questions and demand answers. Unlike ghosts, politicians can be held accountable because ghosts eventually fade with the morning mist.
Ballots, however, have a habit of lingering for years. If anything, the message for this election season is simple, let voters cast their ballots with clear eyes, not clouded by candidates’ grandstanding.
Let candidates compete with conviction, not character assassination. And let winners govern with memory – recalling what they said and why people believed in them. Because in the end, elections should not feel like haunted houses.
They should feel like something far rarer, a living democracy, fully awake and unafraid to face itself.
