Bukit Gelugor by-election: Seat to be declared vacant after funeral

The death of DAP’s Bukit Gelugor parliamentarian Karpal Singh yesterday is expected to trigger a by-election at the constituency in Penang.

Dewan Rakyat Speaker Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia will inform the Election Commission (EC) of the vacancy of the seat next week, telling The Malay Mail Online that it was “only proper” to declare the constituency vacant after Karpal’s burial ceremony this Sunday.

“The nation has lost a brave and well respected very senior politician. He was a very effective ‘check and balance’ parliamentarian and for that matter the executive had lost a worthy adversary,” said Pandikar in an SMS to the news portal.

Pandikar also called Karpal a “friend” despite the two having argued numerous times in Parliament, with the Speaker kicking the latter out of the august house more than a few times.

“But unknown to many, we were good friends, always communicated through memos and notes in Parliament. We have deep respect towards each other,” he reportedly said.

Meanwhile, there were several netizens who asked the Barisan Nasional not to contest or to avoid a by-election at the federal seat.

Sad & shocked. I do hope that BN will surprise me by not contesting the Bukit Gelugor by election.
— alvinlooi (@alvinlooi) April 17, 2014

@NajibRazak Dato' Seri, I'm one of your many supporters in BN, please avoid By-Election at Bukit Gelugor. Thank you.
— Lim Cai Hin (@LimCaiHin) April 18, 2014

In the 13th General Election last year, Karpal retained the Bukit Gelugor seat with 55,839 votes, a 41,778-vote majority over BN-MCA’s Teh Beng Yeam who got 14,061 votes.

That year, there were 81,897 voters, 75% of them Chinese, 14% Malay, and 10% Indian.

Karpal held the seat the two previous terms, both times beating Gerakan candidates. In 2008, he won Koay Kar Huah by a majority of 21,015 votes; and in 2004 against Lim Boo Chang by a slim 1,261 votes.

In 1999, his son Jagdeep Singh Deo lost to MCA's Koay Kar Huah by a majority of 4,017 votes.

Karpal, 73, died after the Toyota Alphard he was traveling in crashed with the five-tonne lorry along the North-South Highway near Gopeng, Perak at about 1am yesterday.

The accident also claimed the life of his long-time assistant, Michael Cornelius Selvam Vellu, 39.

Bukit Gelugor was previously a state constituency under the Jelutong parliamentary constituency, a seat Karpal held for 21 years between 1978-1999. It was only upgraded to a parliamentary constituency in 2004.

The law requires a by-election to be held within 60 days of a seat being vacated.