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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 August 2009
The purpose of the present article is to analyse the voting at the Sarawak elections of 1970, particularly at the state, as opposed to the parliamentary, election. The administration of the elections, election issues, and the methods of campaigning used by the parties are described elsewhere. Nevertheless, a few words of background explanation may be useful.
1 By the authors in their forthcoming book on political development in Sarawak and Sabah.
2 There were also three nominated members, three ex-officio members, and the Speaker.
3 On the 1963 elections see: Report on the General Elections, 1963 (Kuching, 1963)Google Scholar; The Sarawak Gazette, Vol. LXXXIX, No. 1264, 31st 08, 1963, pp. 174–192Google Scholar; Ratnam, K. J. and Milne, R. S., The Malayan Parliamentary Election of 1964 (Kuala Lumpur, 1967), Ch. XGoogle Scholar; Tilman, R. O., “Elections in Sarawak”, Asian Survey, Vol. III, No. 10, 10, 1963Google Scholar.
4 Both plans A and B are to be found in Report of Election Commission on Delimitation of Parliamentary and State Constituencies in Sarawak (Kuala Lumpur, 1968)Google Scholar.
5 The same provisions applied to the Sabah parliamentary elections, which had also been begun according to a staggered timetable.
6 In two seats where a candidate had died (the parliamentary constituency of Kanowit and the state constituency of Bengoh) fresh nominations were called for and the 1970 elections were held a few weeks later than those for the other seats.
7 Because of a dispute about the allocation of seats, some Pesaka and Bumiputera (or SCA) candidates fought against each other.
8 E.g., Communism and the Farmers (Kuching, 1961)Google Scholar; The Danger Within (Kuching, 1963)Google Scholar; The Communist Threat to Sarawak (Kuala Lumpur, 1966)Google Scholar.
9 The population percentages are for 1962 and 1968, because it was in these years that the electoral rolls were compiled.
10 “Malays” includes “Melanaus”, of whom approximately two-thirds are Muslims. “Dayak” includes all other Natives, and covers a very wide range of ethnic groups, some of which have not very much in common. In the population figures non-indigenous persons who are not Chinese are omitted, consequently the population percentages do not add up to 100. 1963 figures are from sources in page 1, footnote 3. 1969/1970 figures are by courtesy of the Supervisor of Elections, Sarawak.
11 According to one estimate, the Chinese who were not qualified to vote because of non-citizenship amounted to about 8% of the population over 21.
12 The constituencies as originally drawn in Plan A gave an even greater advantage to the Dayak bloc.
13 In the previous Council Negri they had 23 out of the 36 (indirectly) elected members; 20 out of the 23 were “Dayaks”.
Contrast the situation in Sabah, 1967, where the Kadazans and Muruts roughly corresponded to the Dayaks, as constituting the non-Muslim Natives. They were the strongest bloc in only 13 out of 32 seats, while in another. seat they were equal in strength with the Muslim Natives. Moreover, about 7% of the Kadazans were Muslims [Milne, R.S. and Ratnam, K. J., “Patterns and Peculiarities of Ethnic Voting in Sabah, 1967”, Asian Survey, Vol. IX, No. 5 (1969)Google Scholar].
14 For further details see the forthcoming book by the authors on political development in Sarawak and Sabah.
15 E.g. in S19, S20 and S21.
16 See p. 385.
17 Counting the winning Independent who later joined Pesaka.
18 Independent candidates, one of whom was successful, are omitted.
19 Including Independents.
20 Includes a small percentage of non-Natives who were not Chinese.
21 A fascinating comparison may be made between the Parliamentary seat, P. 122 (Bandar Kuching) and the two state seats of which it was composed S3 and S4.
In absolute terms S3 had 6763 Malay electors, while S4 had only 712, a difference of 6050. If it is assumed that just over 80% of these electors voted, this would give a figure of about 5000 more Malays voting in S3 than in S4. The difference in the SCA vote between the two seats was 4421. The inference is that almost 90% of the Malays who voted, voted for the SCA.
Equally striking was the figure for rejected ballots in P. 122, the highest percentage in Sarawak, where the nomination forms for the SCA candidate were defective. The figure was 4505 more than the combined totals for S3 and S4. This represents the number of electors (the vast majority of them Malays) who in the absence of an SCA, or Bumiputera, candidate refused to cast a vote for the SUPP or for one of the two Chinese Independents.
22 Note that there is not the same problem in finding the source of Bumiputera candidates' votes. The proportion of Chinese electors voting for such candidates is so small in most cases that for practical purposes it may be ignored.
23 For the 11 seats the score for Chinese and Malay parties taken together was Plus 4·3%; for the Dayak parties it was Minus 4·3%.
24 Including Independents.
25 Not the SCA, because the seats contested by the SCA were excluded from the calculation.
26 It will be recalled that at the time of the election about half the membership of SUPP was non-Chinese.
27 A breakdown of the ethnic vote into sub-categories would suggest additional findings For instance, the “Dayak” parties did particularly badly in the First Division “Dayak’ seats where the Land Dayaks were in a majority.
28 Although S44 had a Chinese majority in the electorate, it was also won by the SCA only because of the Malay vote.
29 One might perform similar calculations to show the effects of other split votes. For instance, it could be argued that the “Alliance” vote was split by both Pesaka and Bumiputera putting forward candidates in S1, and S18 with the result that SUPP and SNAP, respectively, won these seats. In S26 there were both Pesaka and SCA candidates with a higher joint vote than the SUPP winning candidate.
30 It would be interesting to compare the vote for the 1963 district council elections with the vote for the state elections of 1970. Unfortunately, there were quite a number of uncontested seats in 1963, and not enough information is available to allocate all the unsuccessful Alliance candidates to the constituent parties which then made up the Alliance. However, the number of seats won in 1963 may be compared with the number of seats won in 1970 (the BARJASA, Pesaka, SNAP and SCA seats include the seats of Independents who switched to the Alliance immediately after the election; see Ratnam and Milne, op. cit., Table XIV, p. 290. Other Independents' seats are ignored).
Bumiputera in 1970 corresponded to PANAS and BARJASA in 1963. If the Bumiputera and SCA totals are taken together (which is legitimate because of the heavy Malay support given to SCA candidates) the percentages for the two years are not too different.
31 Cf. Ratnam and Milne, pp. 277–278 and 407. The opposition parties frequently alleged that the delays occurred because the Alliance was afraid that it would lose if the election were held in 1967 or 1968.
32 See the Sarawak Press for the second week of July, 1970.
33 Jones, L. W., The Population of Borneo: A Study of the Peoples of Sarawak, Sabah and Brunei (London, 1966), Table 88, p. 171Google Scholar.