Coming on the heels of the rejection of former deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim's final appeal and the imprisonment of Keadilan Youth chief Mohd Ezam Mohd Nor for exposing corruption, the current lop-sided redelineation of electoral constituencies is the latest serial bombshell that exploded the myth of Malaysia as a democracy and a land with the rule of law.

Through this current redelineation, 25 parliamentary seats are added to the present pool of 166 (Sarawak excluded), representing a national increase of 15 percent.

Instead of spreading the increase across the country in accordance with voter increases, the bulk of the additional seats are concentrated in the fortresses of ruling party Barisan Nasional (BN), while none is given to opposition strongholds.

For instance, in the states of Johor and Sabah, where BN has 100 percent control, the additional seats are six (+30 percent) and five (+25 percent) respectively, while opposition-controlled Kelantan and Terengganu are allocated with none.

In other major states, disproportionately high allocations are given to the ones where BN is strong, such as Pahang and Penang, where BN had almost a clean sweep in the last election.

In contrast, where stiff electoral contests are expected between BN and the opposition such as in Selangor, Federal Territory (KL) and Kedah, allocations are well below voter increases.

These grossly unfair distributions can be seen in one glance from the following table:

1993 2002 % increase
Registered voters (,000) No of seats Registered voters (,000) No of seats Registered voters No of seats
Johor 982 20 1,224 26 25% 30%
Sabah 20 25 25%
Kelantan 564 14 655 14 16% 0%
Terengganur 337 8 411 8 22% 0%
Pahang 457 11 555 14 21% 27%
Penang 563 11 659 13 17% 18%
Selangor 949 17 1,369 22 44% 29%
FT (KL) 532 10 664 11 25% 10%
Kedah 564 14 656 14 17% 0%

It is apparent from the above table that BN-favoured states of Johor, Sabah, Pahang and Penang enjoy generous increases, while the disfavoured states of Kelantan, Terengganu, Selangor, FT and Kedah enjoy either nothing or meagre increases, when these are compared with increases of registered voters.

The extent of deprivation of additional seats to the latter states varies in direct proportion to the degree of displeasure held by BN for these states.

As expected, the above redelineation has been roundly condemned by all the opposition parties and non-governmental organisations. To this criticism, the Election Commission (EC) could only mutter lame excuses by alluding vaguely to the necessity to consider factors such as the density of population, geographical size and availability of infrastructure facilities, etc.

None of these excuses is acceptable, as these variations in characteristics among the various states have existed all along, and we are not talking about the absolute number of voters per constituency now, but the changes in the number of constituencies that we must make to the various states to take population growth there into account.

And so it is obvious that it is the increases in registered voters that should dictate how the additional seats are to be allocated to the various states.

As for the contrast between the skyrocketing increase in Johor and the dormancy in Kelantan or Terengganu, EC advanced the theory that this is attributed to Johor's fast pace of economic development as compared with the economic backwaters of Kelantan or Terengganu, where the population has even migrated to other states in search of better economic opportunities resulting in population loss.

Alas, this seemingly smart claim is not supported by cold statistics. The so-called backward states of Kelantan and Terengganu have seen their registered voters increased by 16 percent and 22 percent respectively from the last delineation in 1993, while Johor's increase of 25 percent is only marginally higher (refer to the above table).

So, how could EC possibly justify the vast contrast of treatment administered between Johor and the east coast states of Kelantan and Terengganu? Besides, by EC's own logic, the greatly advanced state of Johor, which has better infrastructure facilities, should be able to get by with bigger voter coverage per member of parliament, when compared with the 'backward' east coast states.

This should translate into greater necessity to increase MPs in the latter. But what EC has done is the exact opposite.

Apart from slanted distribution of additional seats, EC has also undertaken to re-draw electoral boundaries even in states where there is no increase in parliamentary seats, with the obvious intention to undermine the chances of electoral success for the opposition while simultaneously bolstering BN's prospects.

A classical example is in Kedah where there is no increase in parliamentary seats. In the parliamentary constituencies of Yan and Pokok Sena which are occupied by opposition stalwarts, namely the secretary-general and youth chief of PAS respectively, the electoral boundaries have been re-drawn to include an additional state constituency in each, namely Gurun and Derga respectively.

Since Yan and Gurun were won by PAS with slim majorities in the last election, the inclusion of Gurun and Derga respectively will surely spell disaster for PAS, as both the latter two state constituencies were won by BN with convincing majorities.

The above intricate manoeuvre is akin to a surgical operation to incapacitate the opposition thereby altering the status quo in favour of BN.

The unabashed gerrymandering in each redelineation exercise has been a major factor in successive sweeping victories by BN, as in the last election when it won three quarters of parliamentary seats while only garnering just over half of the total votes cast.

This kind of totally unrepresentative victory has been made possible largely through totally discarding the principle of 'one man, one vote'. Where it suits BN's interests, EC will not hesitate to distort this principle by as much as 300 percent, as in the current proposed electoral roll where the slimmest constituency has only about 20,000 voters as compared with over 90,000 voters in the most populous one.

The general principle adopted by EC in the past has been, where BN is perceived as strong, lesser number of voters would form one constituency. The reverse is applied to opposition strongholds, resulting in opposition supporters being grossly under-represented.

By now, there should be no more doubt to EC's role as an important instrument of BN to perpetuate its rule through heavily manipulated elections.

This reality stands in contrast to our Asean neighbours, in particular Indonesia, which though freshly freed from a three-decade-long military dictatorship and held its first ever democratic election a few years ago, had won the admiration of the world for having held a relatively free and fair election. And the single biggest factor that had contributed to this relative success was the existence of an independent election commission, which was represented fairly by all participating political parties.

This election body, which was vested with powers to conduct the entire election free of interference from the executive, had successfully formulated election rules and enforced justice and fair play to all participants.

In this respect, Malaysia has walked in the opposite direction. Instead of more democratic elections, we have to face an increasingly partisan election commission, in addition to being slapped with more unjust election legislations.

Indeed, in the aftermath of the Asian Financial Crisis, while our Asean neighbours Indonesia and Thailand have made big strides in the democratisation of their societies such as free and fair elections, freedom of expression, independence of democratic institutions free from executive dominance etc., Malaysia is regressing into deeper repressions: more injustices in the courts, more arbitrary arrests of legitimate political dissidents, more suppression of free expressions, more undemocratic legislations, more manipulations of our democratic institutions such as the judiciary, attorney-general, police, election commission, anti-corruption agency...the list goes on.

In this time of rapid ICT revolution and globalisation, the trend of the world is towards liberalisation and democratisation, for the competition for survival and excellence among societies and nations have been shifted from the battlefields to the development of the individual minds. It is now the creative mind that will reign supreme.

Under this trend, even the long repressed Asian societies like North Korea and Burma are reaching out towards liberalisation, perhaps being inspired by their giant neighbour China, where the fruits of liberalisation is only too obvious for the world to see.

Can Malaysia afford to buck this trend? How long can the BN leadership hope to contain its people in the cage before destroying them?