SYDNEY: A swing by disgruntled Asian voters could help throw Australian Prime Minister John Howard out of his own parliamentary seat in elections this week, community leaders and analysts say.

Howard has held the Sydney seat of Bennelong for 33 years, but a growing Asian population, redrawn boundaries and a celebrity opponent have faced the conservative leader with what he admits will be a tough fight.

The centre-left opposition Labour Party, led by Mandarin-speaking former diplomat Kevin Rudd, has fielded popular former television journalist Maxine McKew in a bid to win the 4.3 per cent swing needed to oust Howard.

“I think the Asians seem to be moving towards Maxine,” Tony Pang, president of the Chinese Australian Forum, said. “But it will be a very close fight.

“The Chinese call Bennelong the eye of the dragon — in other words it’s a very crucial seat, if that falls everything will fall.” A recent Galaxy poll in Bennelong showed McKew ahead of Howard by 52 points to 48. If Howard is ousted, after nearly 12 years in power, he will be the first prime minister in 70 years to lose his own seat.

Pang, whose organisation was formed in 1985 to raise political awareness within the growing Chinese Australian community, said Asians hold about 30 per cent of the vote in Bennelong, with the Chinese alone making up 17.5 per cent.

“So it’s a very significant amount of votes in terms of toppling the prime minister,” he said.

Pang pointed to the economy, education and immigration policies as crucial issues for Asians.

“The Chinese like the economy, they’re doing well, but on other hand they feel Australia is doing well because of China, nothing else, so no matter who was in power the economy would have done well anyway,” he said.

The view that China’s insatiable appetite for Australian minerals is the main force driving the economy is dismissed by Howard but promoted by Rudd.

“Immigration is another issue. The Asian population is not happy about the citizen test,” Pang said, referring to a new requirement that citizens must pass a test in English of their knowledge of Australian culture.

“The Chinese are also influenced by the ability of Rudd to speak Mandarin, they’re very impressed with that,” he added.

Rudd learnt Mandarin ahead of a diplomatic posting to Beijing, and his daughter this year married a Chinese Australian.

A series of interest rate rises could also hurt Howard with voters who are moving into the middle class and paying mortgages on their homes, said the editor of Hoju Donja, Sydney’s Korean daily newspaper.

“For the last four elections, 60 to 70 per cent of Korean voters in Bennelong supported Mr Howard but this time there is a change,” he said.

Asian voters felt Rudd would be a safe pair of hands for the economy and might take the opportunity of showing how much they resented Howard’s perceived lack of interest in the Asian community.

“He has witnessed the development of the Chinese and Korean communities for the last 15-20 years, but when it comes to migration and multicultural issues he always says look at the Italian or Greek community success stories, he never mentioned the Chinese or Koreans at all for the last 11 years.“But this year is different, he feels he may lose his vote so now he is trying to be friend to the Korean and Chinese community. It’s very, very absurd and we think it’s a ridiculous political gesture. We don’t like that.”

Political analyst Damien Kingsbury points out that Bennelong’s redrawn boundaries have made the seat more marginal and that “if any single group votes more or less as bloc against Howard he would be in a very awkward position.

“There’s not much doubt that Howard has from time to time played race as an election issue and I think it might be possible that the Asian community would give him his comeuppance on that.”Nationally, a series of opinion polls has shown Howard and his Liberal-National coalition heading for defeat at the hands of Labour.—AFP