By Ling Hui and Chris Bishop
KUCHING, July 16: ‘You can’t just dangle the carrot in front of the youth and expect them to bite,’ Minister of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts Dato Sri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah tells Bandar Kuching MP Dr Kelvin Yii.
Abdul Karim said the youth today are mature, demanding, and not easily tempted or persuaded with simple rewards.
“The young voters are very mature now. They follow the current news and have seen for themselves whether the existing government is a good government or otherwise.
“So, you can’t just dangle the carrot in front of them and expect that they take it, no. It might have been different 10 to 20 years back. You put goodies in front of the voters, they might snatch it up.
“Not anymore, especially with the young voters. They have their own demand, and they know what they want,” he said.
Abdul Karim was commenting on Dr Yii’s July 14 statement saying that Democratic Action Party (DAP) would be placing more emphasis on young candidates for the upcoming 15th General Election (GE15).
To this, Abdul Karim questioned Dr Yii whether the latter implied that voters of older age groups are unimportant.
“Personally, I see, whether you are 18 or 25 years old, 45 or 50 years old, you are as important.
“Is Kelvin Yii trying to say that those in the older age groups are not important? If he thinks that way, I hope those in the older groups don’t vote for DAP.
“Let it (DAP supporters) be only the younger ones because it seems he only looks after the youngsters,” Abdul Karim told reporters at a press conference in Gedong today.
When asked whether Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) would be fielding more young candidates in GE15, he said it has always been the party’s tradition to have a balanced composition of representatives not only in terms of age but also gender. — DayakDaily
