Kota Kinabalu: In Malaysia, any constitutional amendment requires two-third majorities in both houses of Parliament, therefore it is crucial for Sabah as well as Sarawak to control one third of the parliamentary seats in the Dewan Rakyat as well as a controlling bloc in the Senate (Dewan Negara).
This is to ensure that that the interests of East Malaysia States are not ridden roughshod by Malayan parties’ majoritarianism in Parliament that was at the root of the ‘demotion’ of the two Borneo partners in the formation of Malaysia to merely another two states among the states of the previous Federation of Malaya as designed by the Federal government in the 1970s, which was against the spirit of the Malaysia agreement 1963 (MA63).
