Malaysia election: Just two hours from KL, but time stands still in Bagan Datuk

BAGAN DATUK, Perak - Bagan Datuk has come under the microscope during the ongoing 15th general election campaign in Malaysia due to the man who has represented this constituency for 27 years – Zahid Hamidi.

Being the Umno president, he is within touching distance of the ultimate seat of power in Malaysia – the post of prime minister. He is also

being tried for graft involving millions of ringgit,

and naturally that brings scrutiny to the area he has represented for pretty much all my adult life.

Take a two-hour drive from Kuala Lumpur and you will reach a west coast town of fishing villages, coconut and oil palm plantations, old kampung houses and uneven, badly lit roads.

For those weary of city life, this atmosphere of relative calm can be a great change of pace. For me, revisiting the town of 60,000 people was like being in a time capsule.

I went to school here for a while when living with my grandmother 20 years ago. But it has been at least a decade since I visited regularly, after I moved to Kuala Lumpur and Selangor for my higher studies and work.

The roads are pretty much still the same, and many of the places still bear hallmarks of my childhood spent sporadically here.

My mother was in Bagan Datuk when she went into labour with me, but my birth certificate shows that I was born in a hospital in Teluk Intan, some 40km away.

This was because people who lived here had to go to the neighbouring constituency as this town did not have a hospital. Even today, more than 30 years later, my birth hospital remains the closest one for Bagan Datuk residents.

I can romanticise this by saying that time has stood somewhat still in these parts. But the population has more than doubled in 30 years, and I’d be remiss not to ask: Why has so little changed?

“A lot needs to be improved here – the roads, the economy. I hope politicians stop squabbling and focus on things on the ground, like inflation and infrastructure,” said Mr Tan Kian Fong, 33, who has just started an electronics shop in Bagan Datuk’s Hutan Melintang area, where much of the constituency’s businesses are located.

From the mukim of Hutan Melintang, three parallel single carriageways stretch for more than 30km to the Bagan Datuk coast, located at the mouth of the Perak River. Along that 30km stretch that is dotted by plantations on either side, only one bank with an ATM exists.

Bagan Datuk is a cul-de-sac in the south-west of Malaysia’s fourth-largest state. But, in fact, it is not all that cut off from developed areas, which makes its relative lack of development all the more stark.

Just 33km south-east as the crow flies across the Bernam River that divides Perak from Selangor is the Sabak Bernam constituency. To Bagan Datuk’s east is Teluk Intan some 40km away, while a 90-minute drive north is Lumut, another coastal constituency.

All three areas have seen steady to rapid development over the past decades. Lumut, my home town and voting constituency, has attained city status.

“I think this is partially because we are at the end of the road,” said Mr Mohd Izlahudin, who works at a public health clinic here. “If you look at Manjung (in Lumut), it has a connecting road that takes you farther north in Perak. That’s not the case here.”

The 38-year-old is hopeful that Bagan Datuk’s fortunes will change once a new bridge now in the works connects the town to Sitiawan in Lumut, and possibly cuts travel time for locals in getting non-essentials.

“If I want to buy kitchenware, for example, I would have to go to Teluk Intan and maybe even Manjung right now. Over there, there are hypermarkets, and here, we don’t have any,” he said. Manjung is 100km from Bagan Datuk.

The lack of infrastructure and development is coupled with a lack of job opportunities for young people, making it necessary for them to seek a living in Kuala Lumpur and its surrounding metropolis. Those who stay are the exception.

Kuala Lumpur-based banker Sriniwasrao Ramanaidu, 31, is among the thousands of locals who come back only periodically to visit their parents. “You have fishing here, you have plantations, estates, and aside from that there is nothing much. There’s not much local economy, there are no factories like in Manjung,” he said.

For all its small-town vibes, Bagan Datuk’s place in the annals of history keeps it culturally significant today.

It is home to Beting Beras Basah, essentially a jetty – now sadly dilapidated – where the Perak River starts.

This was where Raja Mudzaffar Shah, a prince from Melaka, entered Perak to be enthroned as Perak’s first king in 1528. As a tradition, every new Perak ruler comes to these parts and dips his feet in its waters.

The town is also home to possibly the highest concentration of Malaysian Telugus, who make up more than 10 per cent of the 58,000 voters here. My own roots are here, as a member of this community.

This is also home to a significant population of Javanese – one of them being Zahid, whose stillborn proposals in his decades as MP of this constituency include widening the town’s roads, bringing in factories and even building an undersea tunnel to Indonesia.

To his credit, he has delivered on some promises, such as the upcoming bridge to Lumut and a community college.

Zahid’s main opponent in the Nov 19 election, Datuk Seri Shamsul Iskandar Md Akin, has expressed shock at the lack of development in the constituency.

And locals, tired of the piecemeal upgrades that tend to be at the mercy of Malaysia’s changing political winds, want a structured plan for sustainable development – and that will hopefully help Bagan Datuk realise its untapped potential.