KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 22 — Gerakan president Datuk Dominic Lau Hoe Chai is confident his party will still be allocated seats to compete in the upcoming state elections.
Gerakan did not win a single seat at the 15th general elections (GE15) as they teamed up with Party Pejuang Tanah Air or Pejuang led by former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.
Gerakan suffered the heaviest loss as it experienced a total wipeout in its maiden appearance. None of the 124 candidates it fielded got back their deposits.
“This assumption won’t happen. Perikatan Nasional consists of Bersatu, PAS and SAPP (Sabah Progressive Party) from Sabah. Following seat negotiations we experienced in Melaka, Johor and GE15 … Gerakan will definitely contest in the six state elections.
“The only thing is the number of seats we want to contest is subject to whether we can win or not.
“Gerakan is a non-ethnic party, Bersatu is for the Bumiputra while PAS is for the Muslims. So Gerakan will play the role for the non-Malay non-Muslim segment,” Dominic said during the Perikatan Nasional (PN) CNY Open house event in Cheras today.
Of the 124 candidates, most of them were from Pejuang (83). The rest were from Parti Bumiputera Perkasa Malaysia, or Putra (30); Barisan Jemaah Islamiah Se-Malaysia, or Berjasa (7); and Parti Perikatan India Muslim Nasional, or Iman (4).
“We won’t contest all the seats for non-Malay and non-Muslims as Bersatu has an alliance wing consisting of non-Malays while PAS have their PAS supporters gathering for non-Muslims.
“So all this will have discussions, and we will come up with the best seat allocation for us since time is also running out and we need to start preparing,” he added.
Lau said they would use all the upcoming festive seasons to ascertain the people’s support towards them.
He said their experience from previous elections has fostered a stronger bond between all the parties in PN.
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