The horse-trading in 2004

I have been saying for years that Umno does not need to win 50% of the votes to win 50% of the seats. In 1969, the Alliance Party of Umno, MCA and MIC won only 49.3% of the votes but 65.97% of the seats -- less than 1% short of two-thirds. And that involved only three parties mind you -- Umno, MCA and MIC. The opposition, which won 50.7% of the votes, won only one-third of the seats.

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

SPR: Calon tidak puas hati dengan keputusan boleh fail petisyen

Calon yang tidak berpuas hati dengan keputusan pilihan raya umum ke-13 (PRU13), boleh mengemukakan petisyen atau bantahan terhadap proses pengundian itu selepas pewartaan keputusan oleh Suruhanjaya Pilihan Raya (SPR).

Timbalan Pengerusi SPR Datuk Wan Ahmad Wan Omar berkata tempoh untuk berbuat demikian ialah 21 hari selepas tarikh pewartaan.

Menurutnya, SPR dijangka selesai mewartakan keputusan PRU13 itu dalam masa dua minggu.

Katanya petisyen itu boleh dikemukakan di Mahkamah Tinggi di negeri masing-masing dan akan diselesaikan dalam masa enam bulan.

“Sekiranya mereka masih tidak berpuas hati dengan keputusan Mahkamah Tinggi, mereka boleh membuat rayuan di Mahkamah Persekutuan untuk keputusan muktamad,” katanya ketika diwawancara dalam rancangan ‘Helo Malaysia’ terbitan BernamaTV, malam tadi.

Menurut beliau pada PRU 2004, SPR menerima lebih 30 petisyen berhubung keputusan PRU dan petisyen yang paling banyak diterima ialah pada PRU 1999 yang melibatkan 40 petisyen.

Pada PRU 2008 hanya 26 petisyen yang dikemukakan sedangkan ketika itu berlaku tsunami politik yang tidak berpihak kepada Barisan Nasional.

Katanya sesuatu petisyen boleh dibuat atas sebab-sebab perbuatan rasuah atau sebarang salah laku yang mungkin telah menjejaskan pilihan raya, ketidakpatuhan undang-undang dan peraturan pilihan raya.

“Rakyat berhak mencabar keputusan PRU, tetapi melalui saluran undang-undang.

Jangan pergi ke jalan raya berdemonstrasi dan memanggil seluruh dunia menceritakan kami tolak PRU,” katanya. – Bernama

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The Election Commission has asked all those who are not happy with the election result to file Election Petitions in court and get the results declared null and void. That is actually very good advice and I hope Pakatan Rakyat will do that as soon as possible because there is a deadline for this. Once past the deadline you will miss the boat.

I was working in the PKR party HQ back in the 1999 general election. We expected the opposition coalition, Barisan Alternatif, to win the election back then -- mainly because of the ‘Reformasi Tsunami’ that was sweeping Malaysia. That is what happens when you get psyched by the huge crowds that attend the opposition rallies or ceramah.

Unfortunately, although Barisan Alternatif won 43.5% of the votes -- mainly in the Malay heartland of Kelantan, Terengganu and Kedah -- they managed only 23.32% of the seats. Barisan Nasional, which won 56.5% of the votes, won 76.68% of the seats.

More disappointing was the fact that the Chinese voters rejected both Lim Kit Siang and Karpal Singh who lost the election. Lim Kit Siang was then the Opposition Leader in Parliament but because PAS won the most number of seats, the PAS President Uztaz Fadzil Noor took over as the new Opposition Leader.

Soon after that we lodged a protest and demanded a meeting with the Election Commission. PAS and PKR were represented and, if my memory serves me right, DAP did not attend the meeting. Mustaffa Ali and Azmin Ali were amongst those who attended the meeting.

That was about 13 years ago.

Amongst some of the electoral reforms that we pushed for were to abolish the postal voting system and to redraw the election boundaries. As it stands, Barisan Nasional can win just 50% of the popular votes but get 60% of the seats while the opposition’s 50% share of the votes gives them only 40% of the seats.

See the graphics below where it shows that for the same number of votes (about 2.5 million each) Barisan Nasional can win 50 seats opposed to only 30 seats for the opposition. (I have picked up just 80 seats representing 50% of the 10 million voters as an example but you can do your own analysis for the entire 222 seats if you wish -- it is not that difficult).

Hence, a law should be passed in Parliament where each seat should have only, say, 60,000 voters with a plus-minus 10% variation. Hence the seats would have between 55,000-65,000 voters each -- a variance of only 10,000 voters between seats. Only then would 50% of the votes give you close to 50% of the seats (I said close, not exactly). 

The Election Commission did not do what we demanded in 1999/2000. So, in 2004, some of us urged the opposition to boycott the general election. Only some of us thought that this was a good idea. Most people, especially PAS, did not. That was because PAS was running Kelantan and Terengganu and they expected to add Perlis and Kedah to their list. Hence why would PAS want to boycott the election and ‘lose’ four states?

However, come the 2004 general election, the opposition got massacred. Barisan Nasional won only 63.9% of the popular vote (not even two-thirds) and yet they won 90.41% of the seats. PKR, which had won 5 state seats and 5 parliamentary seats in 1999, lost all but one seat -- Party President Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail’s seat of Permatang Pauh. The PKR Deputy President, Abdul Rahman Othman, not only lost but lost his deposit as well -- a huge embarrassment for the party.

And PAS, who had hoped to add Perlis and Kedah to their list, lost Terengganu and got reduced to a three-seat majority in Kelantan. Two more seats for Barisan Nasional and Kelantan would have fallen as well.

We then compiled evidence of ‘irregularities’ and filed Election Petitions in court (as Wan Ahmad Wan Omar mentioned in the news report above). Then the ‘other side’ also filed Election Petitions. Hence, while the opposition may have been successful in some of its Election Petitions, there was a danger that Barisan Nasional too would win some of their cases. And that may mean that Kelantan may fall to Barisan Nasional.

One Election Petition that may work against PKR was the one filed against Dr Wan Azizah -- their sole candidate. Dr Wan Azizah actually lost on the first count but won on the second count. She was then declared the winner when they should instead have done a third count and take the two-out-of-three result.

Clearly Dr Wan Azizah was in trouble, as the court would agree that it must be two out of three unless both counts are the same. When the first and second counts differ, then you must do a third count (unless you win both counts).

PAS then struck a deal with Umno that they would withdraw their Election Petitions if Umno also does the same. So both PAS and Umno withdrew their Election Petitions but the deal was only between PAS and Umno. PKR was not included in the deal so the Election Petition against Dr Wan Azizah proceeded in court.

Luckily the court ruled in Dr Wan Azizah’s favour or else PKR would have got zero seats. Hence there were allegations by Umno that the court was unfair and biased while PKR said that the court was just and fair.

Why did PAS agree to a deal with Umno to withdraw the Election Petitions? Well, PAS also committed some ‘irregularities’ and they were worried that while they may succeed in getting some Umno seats declared null and void, Umno may also succeed in getting some PAS seats declared null and void and the result would be they would lose Kelantan.

Dr Wan Azizah, however, was left as the sacrificial lamb to make this deal possible.

So why are we now screaming? Back in 1999 we already warned the opposition about this. In fact, we even urged the opposition to boycott the 2004 election unless the Election Commission gives us a level playing field. Furthermore, we took the case to court and went to all that trouble of compiling the evidence to support our Election Petitions so that we can win our cases in court.

Then they make a deal with Umno and abandoned the court action -- except the one that Umno filed against Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail.

I have been saying for years that Umno does not need to win 50% of the votes to win 50% of the seats. In 1969, the Alliance Party of Umno, MCA and MIC won only 49.3% of the votes but 65.97% of the seats -- less than 1% short of two-thirds. And that involved only three parties mind you -- Umno, MCA and MIC. The opposition, which won 50.7% of the votes, won only one-third of the seats.

So stop screaming. You people sound pathetic. We have been telling you for four general elections that the gerrymandering is stacked in favour of the ruling party. Unless we can get the government to agree to the plus-minus 10% variance for seats, Pakatan Rakyat is never going to win the election.

How many times must I keep repeating this?