House unanimously approves Sabah redelineation despite concerns

PARLIAMENT | The Dewan Rakyat has unanimously passed the motion to increase the state seats in Sabah from 60 to 73.

All 158 parliamentarians from both sides of the divide voted for the motion and no lawmaker voted against it.

This is despite concerns raised by PAS Pendang parliamentarian Awang Hashim and Upko Tuaran MP Wilfred Madius Dungau in their debate earlier today that there was gerrymandering in the redelineation exercise.

Awang argued that the Pakatan Harapan government should make changes in the "gerrymandered" Sabah redelineation exercise which was drafted during the previous BN administration instead of continuing to pursue it in the House.

In his winding up of the debate, de facto Law Minister Liew Vui Keong defended the redelineation of electoral boundaries in Sabah.

"I would like to explain that the redelineation exercise carried out by the Election Commission (EC) was based on the principle stipulated in the Federal Constitution," he said.

The constitution allows some leniency and that the apportionment is not the only consideration in redelineating the electoral boundaries, he added.

Other factors, including the density of the population, the growth of voters, geographic situation and the size of the constituency, would be taken into consideration, according to Liew (below). 

Apart from gerrymandering, Wilfred also claimed that some electoral boundaries were drawn to create a single race-based constituency.

To this, Liew responded: "The creation of a constituency does not depend fully on the number of voters, but also the problem and difficulty faced by the voters in the rural area.

"As such, it is difficult to ensure the apportionment in each constituency in Sabah because the situation of its rural seats was different in terms of topography and demography."

The minister, who is from Sabah, said developed countries which prioritise apportionment of voters also made a similar choice on rural constituency where the population is lesser than in urban seats.

Meanwhile, Liew also rejected requests from lawmakers for the EC to immediately look into redrawing the electoral boundaries.

EC can only conduct the next redelineation exercise in Sabah in 2025 as stipulated in the Federal Constitution, he said.

In 2016, the Sabah Legislative Assembly passed an amendment to Article 14(2) of the state constitution to increase the number of state seats by 13.

The EC submitted the delineation report to then-prime minister Najib Abdul Razak in 2017, but it was not tabled in Parliament.

Harapan tabled and passed the same redelineation report without making any changes. 

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