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202 Hew Wai Weng

convinced. During the question and answer session, members of the audience
posed challenging questions, asking the speakers about the likelihood of PAS’s
winning the federal government or the Selangor state government without
working together with non-Muslims and about the alleged UMNO-PAS
partnership.
PAS ceramah attendees I met evinced di erent levels of support for the
Islamist party. Some were hardcore PAS members, some were dissatis ed
supporters considering voting for PH, while others were unhappy with the
party leadership but still stayed loyal to the party. For an example, during a
ceramah, a PAS member told me:

… one-third of PAS members in our neighbourhood have left the party and
joined Amanah quietly, another one-third are PAS loyalists, while the rest are
fence-sitters. If PH can convince the fence-sitters that they could also champion
Islamic causes, they might vote PH.… Personally, I prefer Nik Aziz’s approach
in upholding Islam; Hadi Awang is a bit too keras [hard-line]. Yet, the party
comes rst to me. I will still campaign for PAS.
Another PAS member sitting next to him interrupted to elaborate with an
analogy of a classroom: ‘the teacher might be wrong, but the textbook is always
correct.… We can criticise the teacher, but we can’t throw away our textbook.
PAS is our textbook. PAS is about Islamic struggle that we can’t abandon’
( eldnotes, 29 April 2018).
PH was well aware that in order to capture Sungai Ramal, it had to
convince Malay fence-sitters who are PAS sympathisers but not loyalists. It
realised that it would be di cult to break through PAS control over many
mosques and suraus in Bangi. erefore, it ran an extensive campaign on
social-media platforms such as Facebook and WhatsApp, and also organised
many ceramah to engage with voters face-to-face—both strategies PAS used,
too. One Amanah online campaign poster, for instance, outlined the party’s
commitment to ensure Bangi remained a Bandar Ilmu (knowledge township),
Bandar Islam Melayu (Malay Islamic township), and Bandar ‘Amar Makruf
Nahi Mungkar’ (township that ‘enjoins good and forbids wrong’). Tajul Ari n,
a former academic, PAS member, and ABIM activist, and among the key
speakers in many PH ceramah, stated that PH would promote Bangi as Bandar
Rahmatan lil-Alamin—an inclusive Islamic township that is a blessing for all.
is statement invoked Amanah’s tagline, Islam Rahmatan lil-Alamin, a slogan
that simultaneously rea rms its commitment to upholding an Islamic agenda
and to promoting social inclusivity. According to Tajul Ari n, as an ‘Islamic
township’, Bangi should o er clean and safe residential neighbourhoods, as
well as be free from maksiat (vices)—thus, it should not allow development of

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