Parliament attendance: Some leaders set bad examples

An analysis of attendance in the Dewan Rakyat during the previous five sittings has revealed that some senior MPs are prone to playing truant.

The analysis also revealed that government MPs have a lower than average attendance record.

This data was supplied by civil society group MyMP, which tracked attendance by analysing the Dewan Rakyat Hansard for the past five sittings since July 26. Prior to this, attendance records were not part of the Hansard.

In total, MPs were required to fulfil their duties in the Dewan Rakyat for a grand total of 71 days since July 26 last year.

Perfect attendance

The record showed there were 18 MPs with a perfect attendance record. Most of them sit on the opposition bench.

DAP led the way with eight perfect attendance records followed by Amanah with three. The MPs with perfect attendance records on the opposition bench were:

1. Nor Azrina Surip (PKR-Merbok)
2. Wong Chen (PKR-Subang)
3. Wilfred Madius Tangau (Upko-Tuaran)
4. Wong Hon Wai (DAP-Bukit Bendera)
5. Wong Kah Woh (DAP-Ipoh Timur)
6. Thomas Su Keong Siong (DAP-Kampar)
7. Nga Kor Ming (DAP-Teluk Intan)
8. Hannah Yeoh Tseow Suan (DAP-Segambut)
9. Fong Kui Lun (DAP-Bukit Bintang)
10. Anthony Loke Siew Fook (DAP-Seremban)
11. Alice Lau Kiong Yieng (DAP-Lanang)
12. Mohd Anuar Mohd Tahir (Amanah-Temerloh)
13. Khalid Abdul Samad (Amanah-Shah Alam)
14. Hasan Bahrom (Amanah-Tampin)

Over on the government bench, there were four MPs with full attendance - two from PAS and one each from Bersatu and Umno:

1. Zakaria Mohd Edris (Bersatu-Libaran)
2. Mohd Salim Mohd Shariff (Umno-Jempol)
3. Ahmad Tarmizi Sulaiman (PAS-Sik)
4. Che Abdullah Mat Nawi (PAS-Tumpat)

Another 20 MPs had a near spotless attendance record of 70 out of 71. [See interactive table at the end of this article]

On average, each MP spent 56.5 days in the Dewan Rakyat during the period. However, there is a small group of MPs whose attendance was not even a third of the 71 days. They were:

1. Mahdzir Khalid (Umno-Padang Terap) [present for 23 days]
2. Abdul Hadi Awang (PAS-Marang) [21]
3. Mohd Shafie Apdal (Warisan-Semporna) [20]
4. Hamzah Zainudin (Bersatu-Larut) [20]
5. Reezal Merican Naina Merican (Umno-Kepala Batas) [18]
6. Muhyiddin Yassin (Bersatu-Pagoh) [17]
7. Michael Teo Yu Keng (PKR-Miri) [13]

Top party leaders

The attendance record also showed some top party leaders do not set a good example for their followers in terms of Dewan Rakyat attendance.

The worst attendance record among top party leaders belongs to Muhyiddin, who leads the Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition and Bersatu. He only appeared in the Dewan Rakyat 17 out of the 71 days.

United Progressive Kinabalu Organisation (Upko) president Wilfred Madius Tangau had the best attendance record among the senior cohort.

On average, MPs would attend 54.5 of the 71 days. Harapan MPs had an above-average attendance rate of 63.1 days, better than the government bench average of 52 days per MP.

Some MPs have legitimate reasons not to be in the Dewan Rakyat, especially cabinet ministers. Several MPs, such as Dr Mahathir Mohamad (Pejuang-Langkawi) had to seek medical treatment while others such as Anwar Ibrahim (PKR-Port Dickson) had to undergo quarantine.

Meanwhile, MyMP co-founder Chak Onn Lau told Malaysiakini the idea for his group came following the Sheraton Move political coup in 2020, which saw the fall of the Pakatan Harapan federal government.

“We wanted more accountability from all sides. So we came up with an idea and we then got a small RM50,000 grant from MCCHR (Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights) to build it.

“Ideally, our goal is to let the media and the public use our data to form their opinions about our MPs. In general, we can see that the overall standards can definitely be improved if the public cares enough about the details.

“Our job is to make those details fun and interesting to engage with,” he said.

Asked what is MyMP’s take on the issue after seeing the data at hand, Chak said they “will let the data speak for itself”, but pointed out that “there are some true heroes” among the MPs.

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- Mkini