KOTA KINABALU, April 13 — Sabah DAP representative Chan Foong Hin is pushing for a motion in the state assembly next week that will seek an amendment to the Federal Constitution to restore the north Borneo state’s position as an equal partner in the three-way federation of Malaysia.

The Sri Tanjung assemblyman also said he will table a motion to prevent alleged gerrymandering during elections, by making it a must for candidates to come from the constituency he or she seeks to represent.

“The aim of both the motions is not only to get Sabah the recognition it deserves, as equal partners as intended in the spirit of the Malaysia Agreement in 1963, but also ultimately to prevent further incidence of gerrymandering in the coming elections,” he said in a joint news conference today with Kepayan assemblyman Edwin Bosi.

Chan said that both motions will have direct impact on the electoral constituencies and make it harder to manipulate boundaries which he claimed favour the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition.

He filed the first motion on April 5 that calls for a rejection of Article 1(2) of the Federal Constitution, amended on August 27 in 1976 that declared Sabah as one of 13 states in Malaysia. He wants the law revised declaring Sabah an equal party to Peninsular Malaysia and Sarawak.

He said the second motion is to amend the Elected Members Enactment 1963 and add a clause to Section 3 to state that lawmakers should come from the same division they are contesting.

He also wants another clause to keep the voters numbers at an acceptable average.

“Once amended, it will be the same as the rule for Parliamentary seats, where Section 2(d) of the 13th Schedule of the Federal Constitution states that delineation of electoral boundaries ought to maintain local ties,” said Chan, who is Sabah DAP’s election director.

According to Chan, if both motions were approved, Sabah would be divided into five districts – West Coast, East Coast, Tawau, Kudat and the interior – much like states in the peninsula – whose boundaries could not crossed over into each other for the purpose of gerrymandering.

Chan said he is challenging the state government to reject the motions that were aimed at fulfilling Sabahans’ aspirations for more recognition from Putrajaya.

“We will see if they can’t even push the federal government to recognise Sabah as one of three equal parties in the country,” he said.

“It would also mean that the Election Commission has to redelineate some constituencies to have a fairer distribution in number of voters which is currently very inconsistent,” he said, adding that the universally accepted margin of difference between voters is about 30 per cent.

“In Sabah, some constituencies have 7,000 voters, while others like my constituency has 22,000 voters. Is my vote really worth one-third of someone else’s vote?” he asked.

He also cited the parliamentary seat of Putatan that includes the nearby islands of Gaya and Sepanggar which is closer in distance to Kota Kinabalu and Sepanggar respectively, and have little or no involvement with each other.

Bosi also said that his own constituency - Kepayan – came under both the Kota Kinabalu City Hall and Penampang District Council.

“This is contravening any logic. There is already gerrymandering going on and we anticipate there will be more in the coming delineation exercise,” he said.

“To be seen as a fair government, these steps must be taken to ensure equal opportunity and fairness in the elections,” said Chan and Bosi.

The Sabah state assembly will kick off debates next Monday, April 18.