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Malaysia’s First-Past-the-Post Electoral System 239

British Labour Party has voluntarily adopted ‘all-women shortlists’ to reserve
a portion of winnable constituencies for female candidates (Kelly and White
2016). Replicating the Indian and British measures might be more di cult
than moving away from FPTP in Malaysia, where the calls for a 30 per cent
candidacy quota have fallen on deaf ears since 1999. e single-member nature
of FPTP makes enforcement of gender quotas personal to male incumbents
and aspirants; parties have little incentive to enforce quotas, which also risk
voters’ backlash.

Table 11.17 Women’s under-representation in/after the 2018 election
Coalition/Party Women as Women as % women
parliamentary MPs as ministers
candidates and deputy
ministers
Number % Number % Number %
PH 28 12.7 21 15.0 9 18.0
PKR 14 18.4 11 22.4 3 27.3
DAP 8 17.4 8 19.5 4 50.0
Bersatu 3 5.8 1 8.3 1 100.0
Amanah 1 3.3 0 0.0 0 0.0
Warisan 2 11.8 1 12.5 1 100.0
BN 26 11.7 11 13.5
UMNO 9 7.4 6 11.1
West Malaysian components 9 15.3 0 0.0
Sabah components 2 18.2 0 0.0
Sarawak components 6 19.4 4 21.1
PAS 10 6.3 1 5.6
Other parties and 11 12.8 0 0.0
Independents
TOTAL 75 10.9 33 14.4 9 18.0
is limitation makes it politically impossible for PH to ful l its election
promise to appoint 30 per cent women to its fty-person administration.
Doing so would require appointing 15 out of 21 female parliamentarians
(71.4 per cent) but only 35 from among 100 male lawmakers (35 per cent)
to the frontbench. To make it worse, with only one woman parliamentarian
each in Bersatu and Warisan and none in Amanah, PKR and DAP would
have to over-compensate, greatly distorting their internal balance of power.

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