Johor Elections: Will MIC get back the 4 state assembly seats from BN?

JOHOR BARU — As the nation awaits the announcement from the Election Commission on the nomination and polling dates for the Johor State Assembly, MIC’s rank and file in Johor have begun to speculate whether MIC will be given back the 4 state assembly seats they were allowed to contest under the Barisan Nasional ticket in 2022.

On the 1st of June, Johor Menteri Besar Onn Hafiz Gazi announced the dissolution of the Johor State Assembly, paving the way for the 16th Johor State Assembly elections.

The last Johor state elections, held in March 2022, preceded the 15th General Election and took place before the formation of the Unity Government, also known as the Madani Government, a coalition between Pakatan Harapan (PH) and Barisan Nasional (BN).

Those elections were marked by three-cornered contests involving BN, PH and Perikatan Nasional (PN). BN emerged as the dominant party, capturing 33 seats, while its coalition partner, MCA, won four. MIC contested four seats but secured only three. Together, the BN coalition claimed 40 seats, forming the state government with a commanding majority in the 56-member state assembly.

DAP, for its part, currently holds 10 state assembly seats. MUDA holds one, the Puteri Wangsa seat, won by Amira Aisya Abdul Aziz with PH’s backing, but that seat is expected to be up for grabs, as MUDA is unlikely to rejoin the PH fold. MUDA is reportedly in talks to align itself with PN instead.

BN has yet to make any official statement on seat negotiations, but sources say discussions are already taking place behind closed doors on the allocation of seats among the BN parties. Since BN has already announced it will contest all 56 state assembly seats single-handedly, no serious conflicts are expected. 

Will MIC get back 4 seats under BN?

Given MIC’s recent announcements that it intends to leave BN to join Perikatan Nasional (PN), doubts are being raised about whether MIC will be allotted the 4 seats it was allowed to contest in the 2022 Johor elections.

MIC contested four constituencies in the last election, Kemelah, Kahang, Tenggaroh and Bukit Batu, winning all but Bukit Batu, which was lost to PKR with a slim majority of 137 votes. MIC has already announced that its plans to join PN have been dropped and that it is still with BN. However, whether the Johor BN leadership will hand over the same 4 seats to MIC is far from certain.

At best, MIC may have to settle for 3 seats instead of 4, based on the formula that coalition parties get back the seats they won in the previous election, while seats they lost will be up for grabs by other component parties. One of the Indian parties backing BN as a friendly party may get the 4th seat, or it may go to UMNO or MCA.

MCA faces an equally difficult test. Despite contesting 15 seats in 2022, the party won only four, losing the remainder largely to DAP and other PH parties.