MCA has no intention of letting go of the Bandar Tun Razak parliamentary seat in Kuala Lumpur, which has been its traditional seat that Umno is now eyeing, MCA deputy president Wee Ka Siong said today.

Wee said this in response to Umno Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin, who voiced support for a motion from the Bandar Tun Razak Umno division for it to contest the seat in the next general election, instead of the MCA.

The seat is now held by an independent MP, Abdul Khalid Ibrahim, formerly of PKR and who was also the former Selangor menteri besar.

Khairy, at the opening of the Bandar Tun Razak Umno delegates’ meeting in Kuala Lumpur yesterday, said winnable candidates should be fielded in the 14th general election.

This, he said, would maximise the BN’s chances of victory, regardless of which BN component party the candidates come from, or the stature of the candidates within their parties.

"We need a new deal. If the old deal is that priority is given to local warlords in the constituency, and even then the constituency is given to certain parties based on (who fielded) the previous candidates, we need to review it," Khairy said.

However, Wee said that any exchange of seats would have to go through discussions between Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak and MCA president Liow Tiong Lai.

'Just demands from the grassroots'

Otherwise, these are just demands from the "grassroots", Wee said.

"For MCA, we never have the intention to exchange this seat…MCA has been contesting Bandar Tun Razak seat all this while. This seat belongs to us.

"Any exchange of seats, or any form of intra-state exchanges, are not meant to be discussed publicly at this level. It has to be brought to PM and the party (MCA) chief.

"Any exchanges of seats will have to get the nod from the BN and MCA leaders, otherwise they are just voices of the grassroots," Wee told reporters in Kuala Lumpur.

The minister in Prime Minister's Department also pointed out whether it was Umno, MCA or any other component party in the election battle, they all contested under the BN flag and all were equally winnable.

The 13th general election saw a four-cornered fight for the Bandar Tun Razak seat, involving Khalid, MCA’s Tan Kok Eng and two Independent candidates.

Khalid garnered 56.4 percent of the votes, beating Tan by a majority of 11,832 votes.

Prior to PKR taking over the seat in the 12th general election in 2008, MCA’s Tan Chai Ho had been the MP for Bandar Tun Razak, since 1995.

In GE13, Umno contested in three of MCA's traditional parliamentary seats, namely Gelang Patah, Kuantan and Wangsa Maju.

Liow has said that Umno has agreed to return Gelang Patah and Wangsa Maju to MCA.