EC’s proposal isolates Shah Alam districts, voters say

The Election Commission’s (EC) proposal for Selangor would leave three polling districts isolated from the rest of its constituency, according to Shah Alam voters objecting to the proposal.

The group’s spokesperson Shamsuddin Drani said that by reallocating the Bukit Kuda polling district from the Shah Alam parliamentary constituency to the Klang parliamentary constituency as the EC proposed, the polling districts Kampung Kuantan and Taman Kampung Kuantan would become isolated from the rest of Shah Alam.

A map provided by Shamsuddin depicts the Kampung Kuantan and Taman Kampung Kuantan - which would remain a part of Shah Alam - surrounded on three sides by the Klang River, with the Kota Raja parliamentary constituency on the opposite side.

To Kampung Kuantan and Taman Kampung Kuantan’s north is its border with Klang, while the rest of the Shah Alam parliamentary constituency lies on the opposite side of that border to the northeast.

“Why create an ‘island’ in the middle of a different parliamentary constituency?” asked Shamsuddin (photo) when met after he presented his objections to the EC today as part of a group of 206 voters from Shah Alam.

He also told Malaysiakini that the EC’s map of the area makes it appear as though there is still a corridor connecting Kampung Kuantan and Taman Kampung Kuantan to the rest of Shah Alam.

However, Shamsuddin, who is also the Shah Alam MP Khalid Samad’s aide, claimed that the place does not exist, and he knows this because he lives nearby.

His group of voters is also objecting to malapportionment among the constituencies in Selangor.

Meanwhile, Balakong assemblyperson Ng Tien Chee chastised the EC for worsening the malapportionment in Selangor after attending a separate local inquiry hearing today.

He said the average number of voters in each Selangor state constituency is 36,586 voters.

Balakong, for example, is already above the average with 42,829 voters, but the EC’s proposal would worsen the discrepancy by increasing it to 51,594 voters.

He also opposed the EC’s plans to reallocate the Taman Bukit Belimbing polling district from the Balakong state constituency to the Seri Kembangan state constituency.

He said this was because almost the entirety of Seri Kembangan is under the Subang Jaya Municipal Council’s jurisdiction, whereas Taman Bukit Belimbing is under the Kajang Municipal Council’s jurisdiction.

“This would cause a lot of confusion and unnecessary problems,” Ng (photo) said.

In addition, he opposed the proposal to reallocate the Impian Ehsan Jaya polling district from Balakong to the Sungai Ramal state constituency (currently known as Bangi).

This was because it is located on the same side of the Silk Highway as the Cheras Jaya, Taming Jaya, and Balakong Jaya polling districts that would still be part of Balakong under the proposed boundaries.

“This is unreasonable because the place (Impian Ehsan Jaya) has close ties with Taming Jaya, Cheras Jaya in terms of basic amenities, and the Malays there even pray at Taming Jaya and Cheras Jaya mosques,” he said.

Under Article 2(c), 13th Schedule of the Federal Constitution, the EC is required to allocate constituencies within a state such that the number of voters in each constituency is “approximately equal except that, having regard to the greater difficulty of reaching electors in the country districts and the other disadvantages facing rural constituencies”.

Article 2(d) of the same schedule also specifies that "regard ought to be had to the inconveniences attendant on alterations of constituencies, and to the maintenance of local ties".

However, the constitution does not specify what “approximately equal” means and to what extent the weightage for rural constituencies apply, or what “maintenance local ties” mean.

'EC gave a very short notice'

Earlier today, the Selangor Menteri Besar Mohd Azmin Ali and all Selangor local governments were also scheduled to present their objections against the redelineation proposal to the EC.

However, Azmin and his representatives failed to make an appearance, and a legal bid to force a postponement of the hearing was rejected by the Shah Alam High Court.

At least two out of Selangor’s 12 municipal councils also failed to make an appearance, after each failed to ask the EC to postpone their session as well. These are the Petaling Jaya Municipal Council (MBPJ) and the Ampang Jaya Municipal Council (MBAJ).

When contacted, Petaling Jaya councillor Derek Fernandez said the EC gave the MBPJ a very short notice, and the 30 minutes allocated for the council to present its objections was unreasonable.

“We can’t prepare a case properly. There is a lot of things to talk about, but it gives us less than two weeks to do that job, which is extremely difficult.

“I did my (objections) on Friday (last week) on my personal capacity and that was a headache too because I don’t have an operator for the projector, I don’t have anybody helping me, and I had to set it up myself. It’s ridiculous, and I was given such short notice.

“But it is my personal objection. For the local authorities, there is a lot more involved than that because it involved the valuation department and all the other fellas coming to give evidence,” he said.

Derek added that the MBPJ had also commissioned three expert reports on the EC’s redelineation proposal and its impact on Petaling Jaya.

He said the EC’s notice of the local inquiry dated Dec 20 last year was sent by post, and was only received on Dec 28 due to the holiday season.

The MBPJ wrote back on Jan 3 this year asking for a postponement. The letter sighted by Malaysiakini asked for a three-week notice of a new hearing date if the EC wants to question the experts who prepared the reports, or a two-week notice if it is prepared to accept the reports without questioning its authors.

Derek said the EC had yet to respond to the letter as of Friday last week, hence the MBPJ did not attend the hearing.

He said the EC should have delivered time-sensitive documents by hand to ensure a timely delivery, or send it by post a month in advance.

Meanwhile, Ampang Jaya councillor Hamsah Djabir said the MPAJ decided not he attend the local inquiry after the EC did not entertain its request for Geographical Information System (GIS) maps of its redelineation proposal, and rejected its request for a postponement.

He said the MPAJ wrote to the EC asking for a copy of the digital maps for study in October last year, but the EC did not respond to the request.

When the EC summoned the MPAJ to present its objections, Hamsah said the MPAJ wrote to the EC on Jan 4 to request a postponement, and the EC contacted the council by phone on the next day to inform that the request had been rejected.

“If we had come, what is there to talk about? We needed that map for us to further our discussions among councillors. We didn’t get detailed information on that,” he said.

In particular, he said the councillors were interested in how the redelineation boundaries affect administrative zones in areas under MPAJ’s jurisdiction.- Mkini