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With the 15th General Election (GE15) around the corner, there are many factors for an individual to consider before casting their ballot.
One of them may be an incumbent member of parliament’s (MP) attendance rate in previous Dewan Rakyat sittings.
According to Parlimen Malaysia‘s official website, there were a total of 89 Dewan Rakyat sittings between 26 July 2021 and 7 October this year.
However, according to civil society group MyMP, only 15 MPs actually attended all sessions, a small number out of the total 222 elected representatives in parliament.
In a blog post made in September, the MP watchdog released an analysis they did of all the MPs’ attendance records for the past year, tracking their attendance from publicly available records, and only missing the last five days of one parliamentary session that was held from 3 October to 7 October.
Image via Jabatan Penerangan/New Straits Times
So, based on 84 parliamentary sittings, here are the 15 MPs with the highest (100%) attendance rates:
Government:
– Sik MP Ahmad Tarmizi Sulaiman (PAS)
– Jempol MP Datuk Seri Mohd Salim Mohd Shariff (UMNO)
– Libaran MP Datuk Zakaria Mohd Edris (Bersatu)
Opposition:
– Merbok MP Nor Azrina Surip (PKR)
– Subang MP Wong Chen (PKR)
– Bukit Bendera MP Wong Hon Wai (DAP)
– Kampar MP Thomas Su Keong Siong (DAP)
– Segambut MP Hannah Yeoh Tseow Suan (DAP)
– Bukit Bintang MP Fong Kui Lin (DAP)
– Seremban MP Anthony Loke Siew Fook (DAP)
– Lanang MP Alice Lau Kiong Yieng (DAP)
– Temerloh MP Datuk Mohd Anuar Mohd Tahir (Amanah)
– Shah Alam MP Khalid Abdul Samad (Amanah)
– Tampin MP Datuk Dr Hasan Bahrom (Amanah)
– Tuaran MP Datuk Seri Wilfred Madius Tangau (UPKO)
Seremban MP Anthony Loke Siew Fook.
Image via Free Malaysia Today
On the other hand, here are the MPs with the lowest attendance rates in the 84 sittings:
In descending order:
– Tambun MP Datuk Seri Ahmad Faizal Azumu (Bersatu): 34 days
– Padang Temu MP Datuk Seri Mahdzir Khalid (UMNO): 33 days
– Tawau MP Datuk Christina Liew (PKR): 33 days
– Langkawi MP Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad (Pejuang): 32 days
– Bera MP Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob (UMNO): 31 days
– Sembrong MP Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein (UMNO): 31 days
– Tenggara MP Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba (UMNO): 31 days
– Warisan Lahad Datu MP Datuk Mohamaddin Ketapi (Warisan): 30 days
– Warisan Semporna MP Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal (Warisan): 29 days
– Marang MP Tan Sri Abdul Hadi Awang (PAS): 26 days
– Kepala Batas MP Datuk Seri Reezal Merican (UMNO): 25 days
– Miri MP Dr Michael Teo Yu Keng (PKR): 25 days
– Larut MP Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin (Bersatu): 24 days
– Pagoh MP Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin (Bersatu): 23 days
Pagoh MP Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.
Image via Bernama/Free Malaysia Today
Besides attendance, MyMP also goes through each politician’s involvement during the parliamentary sessions
Attendance alone is not indicative of an MP’s performance, as the group states how they calculate scores on their website, they also track if the politician questions government policies, tables motions and bills, and participates in committees.
MyMP is an initiative started by the Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights. They are a group of mostly volunteers who manually gather and key in data from public records and websites to hold politicians accountable and to make engaging profiles for the public to get to know their elected representatives better.
Other than a ‘work ethic’ score, MyMP also calculates a representative’s ‘availability’, ‘loyalty’, and ‘win rate’ based on objective data.
The profiles they create may appear to look like fun 8bits, but the statistics are real, they assure.
“Ideally, our goal is to let the media and the public use our data to form their opinions about our MPs. In general, we can see that the overall standards can definitely be improved if the public cares enough about the details,” MyMP co-founder Chak Onn Lau told Malaysiakini in April.
“Our job is to make those details fun and interesting to engage with.”
So, besides their attendance, get to know more about your favourite MPs on MyMP here!
Image via MyMP
Image via MyMP
Image via MyMP
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A political scientist said an MP’s performance should not be dictated by their attendance in the Dewan Rakyat alone:
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