KUALA LUMPUR (Oct 4): The demand for Sabah and Sarawak to hold 35% of seats in the lower house of Parliament, the Dewan Rakyat, would cause major electoral distortions that could undermine the country’s representative democracy, said electoral reform non-governmental organisation (NGO) Engage.
While acknowledging concerns over the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63), Engage opposes allocating 35% of parliamentary seats to East Malaysia, which accounts for only 17.4% of the country’s eligible voters.
East Malaysia currently holds 57 seats, or 25.7% of the total 222 seats, but with an average of 64,508 voters per constituency, lower than the national average of 95,377 voters. Increasing the number of seats in East Malaysia would “exacerbate inter-state malapportionment,” Engage said in a statement on Friday.
“An additional 21 seats would need to be added to the current number for East Malaysia, worsening representation in already under-represented states like Selangor and Terengganu,” it noted.
Additionally, increasing seats in East Malaysia would distort the value of votes, as one East Malaysian would have 2.58 times more federal electoral power than a peninsula voter, Engage said. “This clearly violates the ‘one person, one vote’ principle and undermines our representative democracy”.
Engage also cautioned that the additional seats would greatly increase the power of East Malaysian political parties, as they would then need only 34 more seats from Peninsular Malaysia to secure a simple majority of 112 seats to form a federal government.
“This disproportionality in power for regional parties goes against the democratic principle that a government should be formed by the collective will of the majority, where vote values are more or less equal. Governments formed through such distortions are unlikely to be stable or widely supported,” it added.
On the contrary, Engage expressed support for the Stability and Accountability for Malaysia Project’s (Projek SAMA) proposal to allocate 35% of Senate seats to Sabah and Sarawak, viewing it as a more achievable way to address concerns over MA63.
“This is a more realistic solution to ensure the special rights promised under MA63 are not eroded, and it is more likely to gain the support of all stakeholders,” it said.
On Sept 29, Sarawak Premier Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg was reported as saying that both Bornean territories should hold 35% of parliamentary seats to safeguard against any attempts to cancel MA63 and the rights it promises.
Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Seri Hajiji Noor also expressed support for the proposal, stating that the state would pursue a 35% quota of the total parliamentary seats, in line with MA63.