The Election Commission (EC), instead of addressing disparity concerns, has made it worse in the updated redelineation proposal for Johor, said Mengkibol state assemblyperson Tan Hong Pin.

“The second (redelineation) display proves that the EC had failed in its duties. The disparity between seats had increased.

“The purpose of a redelineation is to lower the disparity, not only for administrative purposes but also for fairness,” he said in a statement today.

An example, Tan said, was the increased disparity between the smallest and largest parliament seat in Johor.

The DAP lawmaker said in the first redelineation proposal, Pagoh was the smallest parliamentary seat with 36,387 voters while the largest was Gelang Patah with 112,081 voters.

However, with the updated redelineation, Labis is now the smallest parliamentary seat with 37,358 voters while the already largest parliamentary seat of Gelang Patah saw its number of voters grow further to 119,175 people.

This meant that the largest parliamentary seat in Johor is now 3.2 times bigger than the smallest parliamentary seat. It was 3.1 times in the first redelineation.

Before the redelineation, the disparity was 2.8 times.

He added that this was similarly reflected between the smallest and largest state seat in Johor.

In the first redelineation proposal, Tan said the smallest state seat was Bukit Kepong with 15,759 voters while the largest state seat was Skudai with 69,132 voters.

In the updated proposal, the smallest state seat is Gambir with 13,839 voters while the largest state seat is Skudai with 65,278 voters, said Tan.

Tan said this means the largest state seat is now 4.7 times bigger than the smallest state seat compared to 4.4 times in the first redelineation proposal.

It was 3.9 times prior to the redelineation process.

Tan accused the EC of trying to benefit the ruling coalition and urged the public to file objections.

The EC published the updated redelineation proposal for peninsular Malaysia on Wednesday, without Selangor, which had brought the matter to court.