Word: abdullah
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...little town called Hope. Chairman Mao sprung from the chili-eating village of Shaoshan, a place whose entire economy now relies on promoting its native son. So it's instructive to think for a moment of the rural district of Kepala Batas, home to Malaysia's Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. The locals of Kepala Batas, located in western Malaysia's Penang state, consider Abdullah, whose ruling National Front coalition is contesting the March 8 general elections, a kindly, avuncular presence. But their real respect appears to be reserved for his father and grandfather, both noted Islamic clerics. Indeed...
...Although Abdullah doesn't inspire much passion even in his own hometown, the March polls will almost certainly hand him five more years in power. Malaysia may be a democracy, but it is one in which the National Front has ruled uninterrupted since independence. The composition of electoral constituencies ensures that voters from the rural heartland, where support for the governing alliance is strongest, wield more power than citizens from urban areas, where opposition parties hold some sway. The weighted system explains why the National Front won 64% of the popular vote in 2004 yet managed to fill...
...Since independence the governments and the presidents have forgotten about the northeast," says El Hadj Abdullah Yusuf, an elder and one of the biggest traders in the town of 20,000. "If it wasn't for the aid workers there would be no hospital here," he sighs...
...upbeat mood is washing over rural Malaysia-and Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi hopes to ride it to victory in the country's March 8 parliamentary election. Rising prices have put hard cash into the pockets of hundreds of thousands of small farmers across the country. The boom should translate into votes for Abdullah's government and for the National Front, a coalition of more than a dozen political parties that has held a majority in parliament since the country became independent in 1957. "Vast stretches of rural Malaysia are backing Mr. Abdullah," says political scientist Shamsul Amri Baharuddin, professor...
...matter how attractive that message may be to those who feel politically and economically marginalized, it won?t be enough to bring down the government. Still, there are signs Abdullah may be trying to adapt. In the upcoming elections, Abdullah's ruling UMNO party is running a younger crop of candidates with fewer ties to Former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, the architect of the country's affirmative-action policies. Abdullah says he needs "one or two more terms" to successfully complete various economic projects he has started. One more term seems certain. But how long his administration lasts after that...