Malaysia General Election May 9th 2018

[Polkergeist]

Jachind,

Are there any estimates about home many extra seats BN can win on the new boundaries passed by Parliament yesterday?

*assuming the vote is the same as GE13

[jaichind]

Jachind,

Are there any estimates about home many extra seats BN can win on the new boundaries passed by Parliament yesterday?

*assuming the vote is the same as GE13

I have to look into that.  I have to assume BN would gain at least 5 seats with new boundaries relative to 2013 with the same votes.  But of course with PAS leaving its alliance with PKR-DAP and with PPBM coming in as a new player there will be a lot of churn in the votes.  All in all I think BN is set for an election victory although it is likely to lose the popular vote just like in 2013.

[Polkergeist]

Thanks Jachind.

Your posts in this thread have been very informative and are appreciated.

[jaichind]

With the new district boundaries rolled out it is likely that elections will be called soon.  Also an anti-fake news law was rolled out which PH complains will be used during the election campaign to shut down PH ads.

[Polkergeist]

Here it comes..

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/malaysia-s-najib-expected-to-call-election-on-friday-minister-10099112

[jaichind]

http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/malaysia-opposition-alliance-hit-by-suspension-of-party

PPBM de-registered for 30 days due to paperwork issues.   Unless this is overturned PPBM could not conduct any election campaigning with its logo.  I guess it will go ahead with election campaigning without its logo.  On the whole I doubt this will make much of a difference.  The net loss in votes due not being able to campaign with the party symbol will be made up in sympathy votes neither of which will be very large.

[jaichind]

Malaysiakini election simulator for Peninsular Malaysia for federal and state elections.

https://undi.info/sim/?en/20.0.0.0.0.50.0.80.0.0.0.0

It allows us to use 2013 results to shift votes between BN PH and PAS to project vote an seat share.

[jaichind]

PRK's Invoke Malaysia came out with their pre-election survey which projected PH at 89 seats BN at 76 seats and PAS at 0 seats in Peninsular Malaysia.  With PH getting, say, 10-20 seats in Borneo then it could end up being neck-to-neck between BN and PH overall.  This is contrary to other surveys which has BN on the brink of winning back the 2/3 majority it lost in 2008.

Invoke polling has Malay support for BN falling
 

And PH support among Chinese surging


But BN support among Indians holding steady
 

Invoke also broke up Peninsular Malaysia into different seat types like I did which were Malay super-majority, Chinese-majority seats, Mixed seats, and Malay-majority (50% to 80%) seats.


Invoke Malaysia expect PAS to be wiped out in Malay super-majority seats with PH splitting the anti-BN vote.  But it also expects urban Malays to swing toward PH as well as PAS anti-BN tactical voting for PH to make gains in Mixed seats and Malay-majority (50% to 80%)  from BN.

[Cynthia]

Speaking from the current point, does the opposition stand any chance at winning,  defeating Najib?

[jaichind]

Speaking from the current point, does the opposition stand any chance at winning,  defeating Najib?

Polling is very bad and biased in Malaysia so no one has any clue ho the election will go.  Key here is the the Malay vote.  If anti-BN pro-PAS Malays tactically vote for PH, Mahathir could claw some BN Malay votes, and the Chinese vote stayes with PH then BN might be defeated.  If not then BN will win and could be a BN landslide if all three conditions are not true.

[jaichind]

https://www.bloombergquint.com/politics/2018/04/08/mahathir-pledges-to-review-china-investment-after-malaysia-vote

Mahathir Pledges to Review China Ventures After Malaysia Vote

I pointed out this before.  Vast majority Malay Chinese voters are for PH and majority of Malays vote BN over PH.  But BN has a much more pro-PRC policy position while PH as a much more anti-PRC policy position.  PRC is for sure backing BN in this election.

[jaichind]

May 9  will be the election.  It will be the fist time ever that a General election will not take place on a weekend.  It seems that BN is concerned that high turnout will help PH so worked to have the election mid week so Malaysia citizens working in Singapore or Indonesia could not return on the weekend to vote.

BN also did an election day dry run a few weeks back to make sure the BN GOTV machine is will oiled.  The fact the election day is mid week, plus this extra BN GOTV preparation, last minute district boundary changes, last minute anti-fake news law, and PPBM de-registered right before the election seems to indicate that BN is pretty freaked out by the fact that it could lose when all signs are that it should be headed for victory. 

Part of it could be that with all these favorable conditions the UNMO would expect Najib Razak to lead BN to a 2/3 majority.  If BN does not gain seats from 2013 then Razak might be out.  Ergo Razak has to go all out to ensure at least a gain in seats of not 2/3 majority.

[jaichind]

The PH opposition and international media also talks a lot about massive gerrymandering by BN to ensure victory.  Part of this is a bum rap in the sense that Malaysia is out of the mainstream compared to other countries. 

One aspect of Malaysia gerrymandering is the packing of voters by ethnicity to create super-Chinese and super-Malay districts to dilute the power of the Chinese vote.  I do not think this that inconsistent with how USA gerrymandering  works, especially when the GOP packs creates heavy minorities districts. 

Another aspect of Malaysia gerrymandering is the fact that the size of district populations are fairly inconsistent.  The ratio between the largest and smallest district is around 9:1 in terms of population size.  Japan has the same issue where the population difference  between the largest and smallest district are 3:1.  In the USA it is mostly around 3:1 as well.  Here I think the critics of   Malaysia gerrymandering  tend to have a point. 9:1 seems very extreme and hard to justify.    And of course the seats that BN are weak in are the ones with the highest population.

It is the combination of these two gerrymandering factors that makes PH victory unlikely and even in an anti-BN wave PH will struggle to get to a majority on its own.

[jaichind]

With PH getting at most 95 out of 165 Peninsular Malaysia seats (back in 2013 it was BN 85 PR 80 and that is when PAS was part of PR), and PH getting at most 6 Chinese seats out of Sarawak's 30 seats , the only way PH can get a majority is to somehow to go from 3 seats out of 24  Sabah in 2013 to 12 out of 24.  So if PH does unusually well in  Peninsular Malaysia then the election winner will be decided in Sabah.

In the end PH and WARISAN formed an alliance but failed to form an all opposition grand alliance with the USA bloc.  It seems the 25 seats will be 16 WARISAN 5 PKR 3 DAP 1 AMANAH.  AMANAH seems to want 2 seats but mostly will relent given its weak position in Sabah.

The 24 Sabah seats are divided into
2 Chinese - DAP will contest both
7 Christian Tribal (Kadazandusun) - 3 PKR 3 WARISAN 1 DAP
16 Muslim Tribal - 13 WARISAN 2 PKR 1 AMANAH

DAP is a Chinese party.  PKR mostly a Christian Tribal (Kadazandusun) party and WARISAN mostly a Muslim tribal party.

So the election alliance in Sabah will be

BN
 UNMO -  Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals
 PBS - multi-ethnic with Kadazandusun and Chinese support
 UPKO - Kadazandusun
 PBRS - Kadazandusun
 LDP - Chinese

PH-WARISAN
 PKR - Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals and Kadazandusun
 DAP - Chinese
 AMANAH - Liberal Islamic (very little support in Sabah)
 WARISAN - Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals - led by Shafie Apdal who used to be one of the 3 UNMO vice-presidents. Shafie Apdal is pro-Mahathir and many see as the de facto PPBM in Sabah.  

USA
 STAR - Kadazandusun - led by Jeffrey Kitingan, brother of PBS leader founder and leader Joseph Pairin Kitingan
 SAPP - Mostly Chinese with some Kadazandusun support - led by ex CM Yong Teck Lee
 PHRS - Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals - led by Lajim Ukin who was UNMO ex-DCM of Sabah before defecting to PKR and then founding PHRS
 PPRS -  Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals

PCS - UPKO splinter mostly with appeals to Kadazandusun - led by Wilfred Bumburing who was UPKO ex-DCM of Sabah.  Was part of USA alliance but wants to ally with PH to no avail

PAKAR - Multi-ethnic but in reality a  Kadazandusun  party.  A PBS splinter led by ex-PBS secretary Datuk Henrynus Amin.   Is looking for an alliance with PH but to no avail.

PKS - PBS splinter - claims to be multinational - looks determined to contest alone no matter what.


USA's main strength is with STAR which is led by Jeffrey Kitingan, brother of PBS founder and DCM Joseph Pairin Kitingan which has Kadazandusun appeal.  Most likely USA will split the anti-BN Kadazandusun vote so if PH-WARISAN is to win the 12 out of 24 seats it needs it has to be WARISAN winning over the BN Bruneian Malay/Muslim tribals vote.

Sabah will also see state elections as well.  For the  Tambunan seat we will most likely see a 3 brother election of the Kitingan clan.


PBS founder and former CM and now DCM Joseph Pairin Kitingan will run representing PBS as part of BN.  STAR founder Jeffrey Kitingan who formed PBS along with his brother back in the 1980s but have since broke with his brother and went over to the opposition will also run.  It seems a third brother Crispin Kitingan who has been not as involved in politics will also run in the same seat representing WARISAN.


Left to right Joseph Pairin Kitingan, Jeffrey Kitingan, Crispin Kitingan.

This is the first election I have seen where all 3 major candidates are brothers.

[jaichind]

PM and BN leader Najib Razak will progressively cut corporate and personal income tax in the next 5 years to continue Malaysia’s shift toward consumption-based taxation, he says in a Tuesday interview in Kuala Lumpur.  The size and timing of tax cuts to depend on oil prices and GST revenue and he expects BN to beat its 2013 results. 

I notice he does not predict a 2/3 majority for BN which at least tells me that the election will be competitive.

[jaichind]

Merdeka Centre survey indicates that BN should win the election with a reduced vote share but most likely an increase of seats from 2013.

It focuses on Malay votes in Peninsular Malaysia as the critical factor which is split BN 53% PH 24% and PAS+ 20%.  BN's hare of the Peninsular Malaysia Malay vote will see a fall of 8% from 2013 but because now the non-BN Peninsular Malaysia Malay vote will be split between PH and PAS BN will gain seats.

Going by key states the BN Malay vote share is projected to be along with my seat catagroization

                  2013    2017        swing           Seat composition
Johor          81.8%  60.9%     -20.9%   3 Chinese, 6 Mixed, 14 Suburban Malay, 3 Rural Malay
Selangor     58.5%  41.3%     -17.2%   2 Chinese, 9 Mixed, 11 Suburban Malay
Perak          62.9%  54.4%      -8.9%    5 Chinese, 5 Mixed,  7 Suburban Malay, 5 Rural Malay
Kedah         54.5%  53.4%      -1.1%                                  6 Suburban Malay, 9 Rural Malay
Terengganu 51.5%  56.0%      +4.5%                                                             8 Rural Malay
Kelantan     45.6%  54.0%      +8.5%                                                            14 Rural Malay


It seems that BN will get a positive swing in Rural Malay districts and small negative swing in Suburban Malay districts while getting large swing away from it in Mixed districts.  Assuming that PAS vote holds up in Suburban Malay seats but they vote hare in Mixed seats stay low then PH will make gains in Mixed seats but lose ground in Suburban Malay seats.

The poll seems to indicate that the PH strategy of having Mahathir's PPBM capture rural BN Malay votes while appealing to anti-BN PAS Malay votes to consolidate around PH is not working.

My baseline project from last summer seems to mostly match this fairly well although it might be too optimistic for PH in  Suburban Malay seats.  I have for now for Peninsular Malaysia

                  BN      PH     GS (PAS+)
Chinese        0       24            0
Mixed           3       26            0
Suburban    37       25            0
Rural            43         0           7
----------------------------------------------
                 83        75            7

Of course the vote share I have for this Peninsular Malaysia projection is BN 40.1% PH 45.8% GS 13.3%.  Back in 2013 it was BN 46.0% PR 53.3%.

This poll seems to indicate that BN will do better than my current baseline in Suburban seats (like at least 10 more) but most likely lose the 3 seats I have for BN which would give BN around 90 seats in Peninsular Malaysia vs 85 back in 2013 which would then match Merdeka Centre survey results.

[jaichind]

I wonder if there'll be a blackout or some other coincidence like that again on election day this year...

Anwar made a lot of claims in 2013 of fraud and I am sure there we funny stuff, mostly Bangladesh immigrants that were given the right to vote (for BN of course).  But my understanding is that the opposition never proved any mass fraud of ballot stuffing.  All things equal I would say BN won 2013 in technical sense fair and square given the rules (which many would argue are unfair such as extreme disparity in terms of district size).

[jaichind]

Asia Times also make the argument I have been making that this election is also a referendum on Malaysian relationship with PRC.

http://www.atimes.com/article/malaysias-election-a-de-facto-vote-on-china/

What is ironic of course is
a) Majority of ethnic Chinese will be voting for PH while it is BN that is the pro-PRC bloc.
b) Even within the Malay Chinese parties, MCA which is part of BN represents the KMT stream while DAP represents the anti-KMT and even pro-CCP stream of Malaysian Chinese politics from WWII.  In fact MCA is pretty much the successor part of the Malaysian branch of the KMT.  So we have the KMT party in Malaysia being part of the BN that is the pro-Beijing bloc while DAP which is part of the anti-Beijing PH bloc has its roots in anti-KMT and pro-CCP politics from WWII.

[jaichind]

In many ways my projection will be "wrong" in some cases even I get the narrative correct due to candidate quality.  The most extreme example is that under my swing model I have PH winning 0 out of 50 Rural Malay seats. 

Of course most likely that will be wrong.  Why ? Because one of these rural Malay seats is Langkawi of Kedah (P004) where Mahathir  will be contesting as the PPBM candidate.   Langkawi had a lot of development took place under BN when Mahathir was PM.  It is likely that Mahathir will win.

In 2013  Langkawi was

BN (UNMO)    68.8%
PR(PKR)        30.7%

My generic model has it in 2018 at

BN(UNMO)     53.4%
PH(PPBM)      24.2%
GS(PAS)        21.8%

But most likely Mahathir will win on the personal vote.

[jaichind]

The candidate list came out and I was able to make an initial guess at outcome.  My projection has BN at 124 seats vs 133 seats in 2013.  The impact of    Mahathir's PPBM and WARISAN joining up with PH seems to cancel out the effect of the PAS split.   PAS mostly falls apart as the BN Malay vote fails to swing PAS's way.

One of the PKR incumbent MPs was not allowed to resister cost PKR a seat.  A bunch of opposition rebels cost PH a hand full of seats (especially in a couple of Borneo Chinese seats) although a MIC rebel will cost MIC a seat.

Failure of PH-WARISAN to form an alliance with USA bloc (PPRS, HR, SAPP, STAR) split the opposition vote and failed to capture 3-5 more seats from BN in Sabah.

Mahathir's impact in Kedah produced a 3-5 more seats for PH than it deserved including both Mahathir and his son.


If you break it down by seat type and compare to 2013 you have

Peninsular Malaysia
 
                                   PH                                    BN                                        PAS
                 DAP   PKR  AMANAH  PPBM  Tot   UNMO  MCA  Gerakan MIC  Tot
Chinese       24                                     24                                            0             0
Mixed            9     13        3                  25                1          1        1     4             0
Suburban              20       6           4      30      26      4          1        2    32            0
Rural                               1           3       4       40                                 40            6
Total           33      33      10           7     83       66     5           2        3   76             6


While in 2013

                                   PR                                BN                                        
                 DAP   PKR     PAS  Tot   UNMO  MCA  Gerakan MIC  Tot
Chinese       24                       24                                            0            
Mixed            7      14       1    22        2       3                  2      7            
Suburban              14       6     20      35      4          1       2     42            
Rural                              14    14       36                                 36                
Total           31      28      21    80       73      7          1       4    85            


Chinese-Borneo
DAP  5 PKR 1   SUPP(BN) 2

back in 2013 it was
DAP 7 PKR 1    BN  0


Tribal-Sabah Muslim
WARISAN  1   BN 16

Back in 2013 it was
PR 0              BN  17


Tribal-Sabah Christian
WARISAN  2   BN 5

Back in 2013 it was
PRK (PR)  1    BN 6


Tribal-Sarawak Muslim
PH  0             BN 12

same in 2013


Tribal-Sarawak Christian
PH  0             BN 13

same in 2013


This leaves us with

BN              124
UNMO           80 (Peninsular Malay and Sabah tribal party)
PBB              14  (Sarawak Muslim tribal party)
PRS                6  (Sarawak Christian tribal party)
MCA               5  (Peninsular Chinese party)
SPDP              4  (Sarawak Christian tribal party)
SUPP              3  (Sarawak Chinese party)
MIC                3  (Peninsular Indian party)
PBS                3  (Sabah Christian party)
UPKO              3  (Sabah Christian party)
Gerkan           2  (Peninsular Chinese party)
PBRS              1  (Sabah Christian party)
PPP                0  (Peninsular Chinese party)
LDP                0  (Sabah Chinese party)

PH                 92
DAP               38  (Chinese party)
PKR               34  (Multi-ethnic)
AMANAH        10  (Liberal Muslim)
PPBM              7   (Malay party)
WARISAN        3   (PH ally in Sabah)
SWP                0   (PH ally in Sarawak)

PAS                6   (Hardliner Muslim)


From a vote share point (which assumes GS runs everywhere which is not totally true so it will overestimate PAS vote share by a bit) of view my projection has it at
PH   45.3%
BN   43.1%
GS   10.8%

Peninsular Malaysia
PH   46.1%
BN   41.1%
GS   12.5%

Borneo
PH   39.0%
BN   54.9%
GS     1.0%


In 2013 it was
PK   50.9%
BN   47.6%

Peninsular Malaysia
PK   53.3%
BN   46.0%

Borneo
PK   36.6%
BN   57.0%

[jaichind]

Doing a stress test on my projection BN could win up to 31 seats on top of the 124 seats (3 from GS and 28 from PH) to 155 which is larger than the 149 needed for 2/3 majority.  PAS could win up to 7 seats (all from BN) on top of the 6 from my projection to 13.  PH could win up to 21 seats (all from BN) on top of the 92 from my project to 113 which would give it a bare majority.

Eurasia Group estimates chances of BN victory at 85% and PH victory at 15%.  I guess here victory is defined being the larger bloc.  Eurasia Group rules out a 2/3 majority for BN citing that the trend the last couple of weeks are actually moving in favor of PH.

[jaichind]

BN Chinese party MCA's President Liow Tiong Lai who is in a neck-to-neck race against DAP in his own seat is coming out with a campaign poster with him and PRC President Xi.  The message is not to appeal to the Chinese vote as such but appeal to the economic voter that he brings in PRC investments.



His seat is actually not a "Chinese seat" where he would most likely lose if he ran in such a seat.  His seat is a Mixed seats where it is 45% Malay 45% Chinese and 9% Indian.  These days BN tend to lose in Mixed seats as well since they tend to be urban and urban Malays have last couple election cycles have been swinging away from BN.   Liow Tiong Lai won his seat in 2013 by a narrow margin and with a PAS candidate in the race this time should be able to win.  But it seems the swing against BN in urban areas has continued so he is still at risk of losing.  His only saving grace is his name recognition as haed of MCA.

My model currently has him winning 49.4% vs DAP 48.0% and PAS 2.6%

[jaichind]

Merdeka Center latest vote share projection for Peninsular Malaysia has it at

BN  40.3%
PH  43.7%
GS 16.0%



which is a swing toward PH since April  when they had

BN  40.8%
PH  42.0%
GS 17.2%


My current projection mode have it at

BN  40.8%
PH  45.1%   
GS  13.6%

I am not sure Merdeka is taking into account that out of 165 Peninsular Malaysia seats 30 has no GS candidate which I am taking into account in my model which could explain the difference between our GS vote share.

The million dollar question is where is the GS vote concentrated.  If they are concentrated in Rural Malay seats then these vote share could be trouble for BN.  Since that means GS will be neck-to-neck in Rural Malays and could win a bunch of them from BN.  And the flip to that is that GS vote share in Suburban and Urban Malay seats are low which means PH would win a bunch of  seats from BN.  If GS support is more evenly distributed between different seat types then it would be a BN landslide.  My model assume the former and as a result my projection is a fairly narrow majority for BN.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Will MCA continue to collapse? I still love them because of this ad:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U38y6tu4-C8

[jaichind]

If one looks at the 2013 election the map looks similar to the US GOP-Dem maps (BN seats are larger in area and have lower population density) with BN as GOP and PH as Dems (concentrated in urban centers with high population density)