MCA “Breaks The Egg” With Two Seats In Negeri Sembilan After 13 Years

MCA, written off as politically dead in Negeri Sembilan for thirteen years, won two Negeri Sembilan state seats tonight — both against experienced DAP incumbents — and walked back into a state assembly that had forgotten they existed.

Facebook: Wee Ka Siong

In Brief

MCA won two seats in Negeri Sembilan, defeating DAP incumbents in Chennah and Repah, ending a 13-year absence from the state assembly.
The bigger upset saw first-time candidate Siow Kong Choon defeat DAP secretary-general and federal Transport Minister Anthony Loke by 491 votes.

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MCA contested seven seats in the Negeri Sembilan state election tonight; they won two.

That is not a great batting average.

It is, however, infinitely better than zero, which is what they had been scoring for the past 13 years.

The party that lost every single state seat in 2013 — and spent the years since being described as irrelevant, finished, and a relic of a Malaysia that no longer exists — walked back into the Negeri Sembilan state assembly tonight (1 August).

Two seats, two wins, both against DAP incumbents, both in straight fights.

The bigger of the two wins was in Chennah, where first-time candidate Siow Kong Choon defeated Anthony Loke — DAP secretary-general, federal Transport Minister, and three-term assemblyman — by 491 votes.

The Chinese press called Siow the 屠龙手, Chinese for “dragon slayer”.

That is not language reserved for ordinary results.

Five Losses, Two Wins, One Comeback

The second win came in Repah, where Koh Kim Swee defeated S. Veerapan.

In the unofficial results, Koh led with 9,779 votes, surpassing Veerapan’s 7,494 votes.

Veerapan had held the Repah seat for nearly two decades, serving continuously since 2008.

MCA president Datuk Seri Wee Ka Siong, who had campaigned in Pekan Titi days earlier, had joked to the crowd that BN only had Kang Jun — Siow Kong Choon — not kang tao, the Hokkien word for cash handouts.

The crowd laughed; today, they voted.

The party had contested ten seats in previous cycles, and this time, under strategic considerations, they fielded only seven — six against DAP in Chinese-majority seats, one against PKR in Johol.

They won two of those seven; the five losses are real, but the two wins are the ones that will be written about.

Still Breathing

Because MCA is not supposed to win anything in Negeri Sembilan anymore.

The party’s obituary has been written so many times that most people stopped checking for a pulse.

Tonight, in Chennah and Repah, two sets of voters decided the obituary was premature.

For the first time since 2013, MCA will have a voice in the Negeri Sembilan state assembly.

The winning candidates are expected to be appointed as state executive councillors — returning the party to the state cabinet after a thirteen-year absence.

DAP had its best night in the state overall, winning nine of eleven seats contested, but their secretary-general lost his seat, and two of their most experienced assemblymen are going home.

On a night when DAP won big, MCA won enough.