Call to review Kota Marudu parliamentary constituency

KOTA KINABALU: Parti Harapan Rakyat Sabah deputy president Datuk Maijol Mahap has suggested that the present parliamentary constituency of Kota Marudu and several others in Sabah be split into two constituencies.

He said this when officiating the annual general meeting of the Harapan Rakyat Kota Marudu Division at the divisional office in Kota Marudu town.

“We need more parliamentary constituencies in Sabah to enhance developments in the state. Population is increasing and Sabah is still lagging in term of development compared with those in the Peninsula, so we need more funds to come to the rural areas,” he said.

On Kota Marudu parliamentary constituency, he said there were 47,007 registered voters during the last election and it is expected that the number will increase to 53,000 in the 15th general election.

It is therefore necessary to split it into two parliamentary constituencies. Kota Marudu consists of the state constituencies of Matunggong and Tandek, he opined, adding that in the last state delineation exercise before the last election, a new state constituency called Bandau in Kota Marudu was created along with another 12 state constituencies in Sabah but it was not carried out completely because the former Prime Minister did not table the Election Commission report in parliament as required by Section 9 of the Thirteenth Schedule of the constitution.

Maijol pointed out that in Malaysia, Article 113(2)(ii) of the Federal Constitution empowers the Election Commission to review the federal and state constituencies with an interval of not less than eight years. For the record, the last review on parliamentary constituencies was done in 2003.

Commenting on the present government, he said, “I believe the new Sabah and federal governments are doing their best for the people. It won’t be easy and we can’t expect big improvements overnight, but to be fair they must be given the time to implement their visions.”