Popular votes in an unequal and undemocratic electoral system

Popular votes in an unequal and undemocratic electoral system

By Prof Ramasamy Palanisamy




THERE is nothing wrong to feel disheartened by the Opposition after the debacle in the Johor state elections as this is expected after an election loss.

It serves no purpose in looking at the results of the election to say that Barisan Nasional (BN) won despite the fact that they did not attain the majority of the popular votes.

On the other hand, there is good feeling among the Opposition that even if they had lost they were still able to deny BN the popular votes.

However, the debate about popular votes doesn’t really make sense in the Malaysian electoral system based on the first-past-the-post system (FPPS).

The mechanism of winner-takes-it-all in an electorate nullifies the idea of the significance of total vote and who obtained the highest number of popular votes.

Given the fact that the voters are not evenly divided according to constituencies, the party that wins the election might possibly receive less popular votes compared to the opposition that received higher popular votes.

But in the final analysis those winning the most number of seats will be adjudged the winners and this is immaterial of the total number of votes.

The problem lies not in the voters but in the demarcation of the electoral system by the Election Commission (EC).

The gerrymandering exercise over the years by giving weightage to the rural areas had skewed the voter distribution.

For instance, states like Sabah and Sarawak might be less populated but more weightage has been given to state and parliamentary constituencies in comparison to Peninsular Malaysia.

This is to some extent similar where rural constituencies are given more importance to urban constituencies in Peninsular Malaysia.

But independent of the EC, urban to rural migration is fast changing the demographic makeup of the constituencies.

However, urban-rural discrepancy in voter distribution continues to be an issue in the country.

A large urban parliamentary constituency might have more than 100,000 voters whereas a rural constituency might have half the numbers.

This has been the perennial problem that stands in the way of a more balanced and equitable democratic voter distribution in the country.

However, for this to happen, there is need for an election commission that is independent of the government or the executive power.

The EC should be made responsible for the Parliament and unless this is done, the electoral system will be skewed and those parties can attain landslide victories in elections without the corresponding popular total votes.

For a fairer and more equitable distribution of voters, there must be political will on the part of the government to engage in such an exercise.

However if political power is dependent on perpetuating electoral inequality, then any constituency delimitation exercise might be a mere academic exercise.

A fairer and more equitable delimitation exercise very much depends on the sources of political power in the country.

As long as political power is based on race and religion, then there is strong reason why the government in power would ensure that any future delimitation exercise would not disturb the status quo.

Alternatively, the delimitation exercise might want to focus on new areas of sources of Malay political power.

Certainly demographic changes might unsettle the existing arrangement but there nothing to prevent the government from changing the delimitation goalpost. – March 16, 2022



Prof Ramasamy Palanisamy is the state assemblyperson for Perai. He is also deputy chief minister II of Penang.