Chinese Votes Did Make an Impact

11 out of the 22 swing parliament seats that PR won from BN are Chinese majority seats (largest voting bloc). Whereas all 15 swing seats that BN won from PR are Malay majority seats. 

Paraman Subramaniam 

In the recently concluded General Elections, the total numbers of eligible Chinese voters were 3.94 million. In Penang they constitute 53.3% of total voters and in Kuala Lumpur 52.2% of the total voters are of Chinese origin. Even though by population the Chinese constitute about 22.56% of the total population in Malaysia but by the number of voters their strength is 29.68% of the total 13.3 million voters in Malaysia. There are also many mixed seats where Chinese voters are present in significant numbers and the way the electoral boundaries are drawn they allow the Chinese voters to be quite influential.

The EC states that 84.84% of the total number of registered voters had cast their vote on the 5th of May. This would mean that we can assume at least 3.4 million Chinese votes were cast. It goes without saying that the majority of Chinese voters are pro Pakatan Rakyat. What no one knows is the actual total percentage of Chinese votes that went to PR.

Considering the number of Chinese supporters that did outnumber all other races at most PR’s ceramahs nationwide, many suspect anywhere between 75% to 95% of the Chinese may have voted for PR in the recent GE. It was also reported that a huge number of Malaysians based in Singapore (mainly Chinese) had returned to cast their vote causing a massive traffic jam at the causeway. If the numbers were at least 85% then it would mean that more than half of PR’s popular votes amounting to 5.6 million would have consisted of mainly Chinese votes. After deducting the Indian votes as well as the Sabah/Sarawak votes that went for PR, this would leave the Malay votes in PR quite a minority.

A conservative estimate could give PR only attracting 40% of the Malay votes in total. Even though they may have received a considerable amount of new, young urban Malay votes, at the same time PR had lost a lot of their traditional Malay voters that they had in the 2008 GE.

If PR had amassed at the very least 45% of the total Malay vote then they would have easily won the elections. In the 4 predominantly Malay majority states Perlis, Kedah, Kelantan and Trengganu, BN lost an average 0.8% of the popular vote versus PR having gained an average 0.53% of the popular vote when compared with the 12th GE. The overall increase of 2.9 million new voters (28% increase) could have contributed to this.

The net difference of total votes between BN and PR in these 4 states in the recent elections is a mere 9149 votes in favour of PR, however it must be noted that Kedah itself has more than 160,000 registered Chinese voters.

 

In the table above, the 23 parliamentary seats have a total average of 26% Chinese voters which may have affected the percentage increase in PR support.

Even Anwar Ibrahim acknowledged recently in the Penang rally that at least half of PR’s votes consisted of Chinese voters. “There is only 25 percent Chinese voters and Pakatan obtained 51.4 percent of the popular vote, what happened to the remaining 26 percent?” he queried. (N/p Chinese votes are however not 25% but almost 30%).

PAS information chief Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man had also particularly singled out the Chinese in his expression of gratitude for the tens of Parliament and state seats that PR had won due to their support. No such thanks were accorded to any other race.

PAS had only won 29% of the parliament seats that it had contested and PKR did marginally better by winning 30% of the seats that it had contested. It was the Chinese dominant DAP that had won 38 out of the 51 seats that it had contested to give it a 75% win margin.

When compared to 2008 GE results, PKR suffered a drop of 3.2% in parliament seats, BN a 5% drop and PAS an 8.7% drop. DAP however enjoyed a 35.7% improvement in parliament seats won in 2013 as compared to the 12th GE. Coincidentally the 2 states that Chinese voters form the majority, Penang and KL, are the only states that PR enjoyed more than 60% of the popular votes.

It gets even more interesting when the swing seats are analysed. There were 15 swing seats that BN had won from PR as opposed to PR who had won 22 swing parliament seats from BN, from GE 12 to GE 13.

11 out of the 22 swing parliament seats that PR won from BN are Chinese majority seats (largest voting bloc). Whereas all 15 swing seats that BN won from PR are Malay majority seats.

The swing seats (22) that PR won from BN had an average of 42.73% Chinese voters. On the other hand the swing seats that BN won from PR (15) had an average of only 11.8% Chinese voters.

The swing parliament seats that PR had won from BN in Peninsular Malaysia (15) had average 56.73% Malay voters as versus 79.34% of Malay voters present in the 15 parliament swing seats that BN had won from PR.

States that PR won more than 50% of popular votes:

Kelantan, Penang, Perak, Selangor and Federal Territory.

These states together consist of 45% of the total population of Malaysia as well as form only 14% of the total area of Malaysia.

States that BN won more than 50% of popular votes:

Perlis, Kedah, Trengganu, Pahang, Negeri Sembilan, Malacca, Johor, Sabah, Sarawak and Labuan.

These states together consist of 55% of the total population of Malaysia as well as form 86% of the total area of Malaysia.

It must be stressed here that the Chinese community did not vote along racial lines but they did appear to vote in one direction in favour of PR as the Indians did in 2008. One could safely say for instance any Malay PAS candidate could have easily won in a predominantly Chinese majority area however the same could not be said that a DAP Chinese candidate could have stood and won in any traditional PAS heartland constituency. The reason the Chinese swung overwhelmingly in favour of PR was in the hope that a change could champion their interests in meritocracy and equality as well as reduce corruption.

PR did not receive support from the Indian community at levels that they had enjoyed in the 12th GE. BN escaped defeat because of the general pullback from PR of the Malays and Indian voters as well as help from their traditional vote bank in East Malaysia.