KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 – Fifteen of 37 women fielded in the Johor state election won in the competitive poll, equating to 27 per cent female representation in the state legislative assembly.
Nine of the 15 elected women representatives are from Barisan Nasional (BN) that won the March 12 state election in the southern state with a two-thirds majority; four from DAP under Pakatan Harapan (PH); and one each from Bersatu, under Perikatan Nasional (PN), and youth party Muda.
The 27 per cent women’s representation in the 56-seat Johor state legislative assembly falls short of the 30 per cent level that is often cited as the minimum representation for women to have effective influence in decision-making.
The nine women candidates from BN elected to the Johor state legislative assembly are Hasrunizah Hassan (Pulai Sebatang), Fauziah Misri (Penawar), Norlizah Noh (Johor Lama), Sharifah Azizah Syed Zain (Mahkota), Khairin-Nisa Ismail@Md On (Serom), Haslinda Salleh (Tenang), N. Saraswati (Kemelah), Nor Rashidah Ramli (Parit Raja), and Rashidah Ismail (Pasir Raja).
Eight of them are from Umno, while Kemelah’s newly elected representative Saraswati is from MIC.
From DAP, Marina Ibrahim (Skudai), Gan Peck Cheng (Penggaram), Ng Kor Sim (Jementah), and Liow Cai Tung (Johor Jaya) emerged triumphant.
The sole successful women candidates from Bersatu and Muda are Alwiyah Talib (Endau) and 27-year-old Amira Aisya Abd Aziz (Puteri Wangsa) respectively.
Alwiyah, an incumbent, defeated four other challengers with a majority of 3,041 to retain her seat for PN. She previously won Endau in the 2018 general election under the BN ticket. Alwiyah was one of just three successful candidates by PN that contested all 56 seats.
With a 7,144 majority against five other candidates, Amira was the sole candidate from Muda to win a seat for the party in its maiden election run.
In terms of absolute numbers, BN fielded the highest number of women in the Johor state election at 14 candidates, followed by PH [DAP and Amanah] (eight), PN (six), Pejuang (four), PKR (three) and Muda (two).
However, Muda fielded the highest proportion of female candidates with two candidates out of seven, or 29 per cent of its candidates.
BN women candidates in Johor had the highest success rate at 64 per cent, followed by PH (DAP and Amanah) and Muda both at 50 per cent.
None of the female candidates from Pejuang and PKR, which ran under its own logo in Johor, won their contests. Pejuang lost deposits in all 42 seats it contested, while PKR only managed to win one seat — Bukit Batu — with a majority of just 137 votes. MIC plans to file an election petition to challenge the Bukit Batu result.
