Dominic Lau Hoe Chai

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Dominic Lau Hoe Chai (born 18 September 1967) is a Malaysian politician who has served as Senator since November 2021 and 6th President of the Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia (GERAKAN), a component party of the Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition, since November 2018. He replaced Mah Siew Keong, who led the party to huge defeat in the 2018 general election in November 2018, as party president.^[1] He was appointed a Senator in November 2021.^[2]

Career[]

Lau was a former lecturer at University of Technology Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur before getting involved in politics.

Political career[]

Lau contested for the Batu federal seat in Kuala Lumpur in the 2013 and 2018 general elections representing BN and GERAKAN which he lost to Chua Tian Chang from the opposition People's Justice Party (PKR) and Pakatan Rakyat (PR) in 2013 and to independent candidate Prabakaran Parameswaran in 2018 who later joined PKR and Pakatan Harapan (PH).^[3] Not long after the 2021 Melaka state election on 23 November 2021, he was appointed as a Senator for a 3-year term. His appointment was criticised as the "compensation" to the party after the party did not win any seats in the election. He brushed off the allegations and clarified that the appointment had already been planned even before the election. His appointment was also criticised by Democratic Action Party (DAP) National Organising Secretary Anthony Loke which Loke said the party was the "cheapest" party in Malaysian politics as it was always among the earliest one who support the parties and coalitions in power in hope that the party would be given positions in return of its support and to leave the parties without power. Loke cited the examples of GERAKAN being the earliest to leave BN after it lost power and support PN after it gained power.

President of Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia[]

Endless electoral defeats and brief representation in Perak assembly[]

On 17 November 2018, Lau was elected as the 6th President of GERAKAN, taking over Mah Siew Keong who was stepping down from the party presidency and who led the party, which was in the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition to a huge defeat in the 2018 Malaysian general election with the party losing all the federal and state seats. The party later left BN and became less active in politics as it did not have any representations in Dewan Rakyat and all the state legislative assemblies. However, in the 2019 Tanjung Piai by-election which was held on 16 November 2019, he led the party to the first election under his presidency by nominating Wendy Subramaniam as the candidate. However, the party and Wendy did not stop the losing streak after 2018 general elections by losing heavily and even losing deposits by garnering only 1,707 votes. During the 2020–2022 Malaysian political crisis, the party briefly regained representation in the Perak State Legislative Assembly by accepting Buntong assemblyman Sivasubramaniam Athinarayanan who was from DAP and PH to the party on 25 June 2020. DAP sarcastically congratulated GERAKAN for breaking its record of lack of representations in the legislatures of the nation. However, Sivasubramaniam later left the party for Malaysian United Indigenous Party (BERSATU) on 4 March 2021. Lau expressed his plan to lead the party to join the ruling PN coalition led by then Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin. The plan was accepted and the party officially joined PN on 11 February 2021. Lau later led the party to participate in the 2021 Melaka state election, again, the party did not win any seats although contesting on the PN tickets which PN won only 2 state seats from BERSATU. In another 2022 Johor state election, he led the party to participate it again. As of now, the party retains no representation in the legislatures of the nation.

Support for Perikatan Nasional and Barisan Nasional governments[]

During the 2020-2022 political crisis, Lau has led the party to support PN led by the 8th Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin who was criticised of failing to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic with unorganised and uncentralised planning to facilitate the strategies to contain the pandemic even before officially joining it as a component party in February 2021. He described the support as necessary to help building political stability and to support the government to carry on its efforts to bring the nation out of the pandemic and to recover from it. However, in August 2021, PN government and Muhyiddin were toppled by a group of 15 Members of Parliament (MPs) from BN and United Malays National Organisation (UMNO). They withdrew support for PN and the government collapsed due to the lack of parliamentary support although BN and UMNO were also part of the government they toppled as they were unstaisfied that BN was not the leading coalition in the government. After that, Ismail Sabri Yaakob from BN and UMNO was appointed as the 9th Prime Minister and the BN government was formed and it regained the leading position in the government again after it collapsed and lost the position in 2018 after the 15 MPs threw their support back to this government composed of same coalitions and parties as PN government was as BN is in the leading position.^[4] PN, although lost the leading position in the government, decided to support the BN government and PN was as well appointed as part of the government. GERAKAN, as a PN component party, supports BN government as well. However, BN and PN only support each other to form governments but not in elections after 2020. Both coalitions did not work together in the 2021 Melaka state election and 2022 Johor state election although they did in the 2020 Sabah state election.

Election results[]

References[]