COMMENT | Harapan on verge of making the same mistake

COMMENT | If there is a sharp reversal in support for the current administration and its ill-timed elections, Umno Baru/BN could lose big time and the possible result could be a hung parliament or even an opposition victory.

One likely outcome could be major parties such as Umno, Pakatan Harapan, Perikatan Nasional or PN (which still includes PAS), and key Sarawakian and Sabah parties, holding big blocks without majorities.

To put in context the unpredictability of elections, how many people dared to predict that the 2018 elections will result in Harapan resolutely coming into power? The only major politician who predicted it then was current PKR deputy president Rafizi Ramli - many others, including those from Harapan, flatly rejected that possibility.

It is because of such possibilities that it is imperative Harapan goes solo for all the seats for Peninsular Malaysia and most of them in Sabah and Sarawak. If the turnaround comes, it will then be in a strong position to take power or negotiate for power with others.

Strangely, it is Umno which knows this better than the others and is positioning itself to contest all seats in Peninsular Malaysia, rejecting alliances with PN, including PAS.

Elections are difficult things to predict. Across the world, they have become so volatile that there is no means to predict outcomes reliably, even when there are carefully conducted, scientific opinion polls done with uncertainty levels given.

As the polling date arrives, last-minute developments can change the course of elections. This happened in...