Ahead of the 14th general elections, a DAP lawmaker has highlighted that Selangor and Penang have registered the highest net migration rates in the last five years.

Serdang MP Ong Kian Ming in a statement said in the period of 2015-2016, Selangor experienced a net migration of 19,400 persons while Penang experienced a net migration of 12,000 persons.

Net migration refers to the difference between the number of people moving into an area and the number of people leaving throughout a year.

This was according to the Department of Statistics Migration Survey Report 2016 which was released last Friday.

"The willingness of people to move to Selangor and Penang is not a short-term phenomenon.

"According to data from the 2011 to the 2016 Migration Survey Reports, the net migration for Selangor and Penang (in five years) were 125,400 and 49,800 respectively making Selangor and Penang the top two states in terms of net migration," said Ong who is also general manager of the Kuala Lumpur branch for think tank Penang Institute.

According to Ong, the migration trend is a reflection that Malaysians are "voting with their feet" by moving in large numbers to Selangor and Penang.

"This is a clear indication that Malaysians have confidence in the state governments of Selangor and Penang under Pakatan Harapan," he argued.

Further, he said that Penang's success to attract the second highest number of net migrants is also commendable.

According to the report, Ong said Penang had from 2015 to 2016 registered the highest positive effectiveness ratio of migration at 58.4 percent.

"This means that the people of Penang will be increased by 58 persons for every 100 of interstate migrants that migrate in and out of the state," he explained.

Outflow from KL and Perak

On the other hand, the two states with the largest outflow of population are Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur and Perak, he said, with a net outflow of 163,400 and 40,000 persons respectively from 2009 to 2016.

Ong hypothesised that people were leaving Perak for better job prospects in other states, whereas Kuala Lumpur's high housing prices could be driving people away to Selangor, where there were possibly more attractive policies.

Referring to movements out of Kuala Lumpur, Ong said 61 percent had moved to Selangor in the period from 2015-2016, compared to 62 percent in the previous year.

"If these trends continue, Kuala Lumpur will soon be a city comprising mostly rich Malaysians and expatriates and also poor migrant workers," he added.

According to the report, a total of 137,377 Malaysians moved to another state in the 2015-2016 period, making up 24.8 percent of internal migrants.

Of those who had moved interstate, it was highlighted that 46.5 percent had cited following their families as their reason for moving.