MIC says Merdeka Centre analysis a ‘blatant lie’
The study showed that MIC cabinet ministers, Dr S Subramaniam and G Palanivel would have lost their parliamentary seats without the advance and postal votes.
(Bernama) – MIC has slammed an opinion research firm here for its ‘flawed’ analysis on the voting pattern of the voters in the recent general election.
Party deputy president, Dr S Subramaniam, said the study undertaken by Merdeka Centre was aimed at creating a wrong impression to the general public.
He said even PKR strategic director Rafizi Ramli appeared to have bought the ‘flawed’ findings.
“The recent analysis carried out by Merdeka Centre, which first appeared on a news portal is a blatant lie,” he said in a statement here yesterday.
The Merdeka Centre study showed that two MIC cabinet ministers, Dr Subramaniam (Segamat, Johor) and party president G Palanivel (Cameron Highlands, Pahang) would have lost their parliamentary seats without the advance and postal voting.
Dr Subramaniam and Palanivel are the Health and Natural Resources and Environment Ministers, respectively.
The report also highlighted that several seats in Johor and the Federal Territory would have also fallen to Pakatan Rakyat, and BN won 22 parliamentary seats with the help of additional postal and early votes.
To this, Dr Subramaniam responded that the total registered voters in the Segamat parliamentary constituency for the 13th General Election (GE13) were 47,009.
He said voter turnout was one of the highest in the history, with 39,807 (84.9 per cent) casting their votes in Segamat.
He said he garnered 20,037 votes, a majority of 1,217 votes against PKR’s Chua Jui Meng.
“Ordinary votes represent for 99.26 per cent of my total votes and the remaining of 0.74 per cent or 347 votes were postal and advanced vote combined.
“So, with 1,217 majority votes, do your math. It is crystal clear that BN won Segamat with comfortable majority with ordinary voters, and not because of early voters or advance voters as claimed by the Merdeka Centre,” he said.
As a research centre, Dr Subramaniam hoped the Merdeka Centre would be more careful in not publishing ‘wishy washy’ figures, just to hoodwink the people.
