Malaysian politician
Leow Thye Yih (Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Liāu Thài-gī) is a Malaysian politician who served as Member of the Perak State Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Pokok Assam from May 2018 to November 2022 and for Aulong from May 2013 to May 2018. He is an independent and was a member of the Democratic Action Party (DAP), a component party of the Pakatan Harapan (PH) and formerly Pakatan Rakyat (PR) opposition coalitions. He also served as the State Assistant Organising Secretary of DAP of Perak.
Education
He is a Bachelor of Optometry.[1]
Political career
Resignation from DAP party positions to support Paul Yong
On 11 September 2019, he resigned as State Assistant Organising Secretary of DAP of Perak along with Malim Nawar MLA Leong Cheok Keng who resigned as Treasurer of DAP of Perak as a sign of support for Member of the Perak State Executive Council (EXCO) and Tronoh MLA Paul Yong Choo Kiong as State Chairman of DAP of Perak Nga Kor Ming wanted to remove Yong as an EXCO member after involving in a rapping case.[2][3]
Rumours of leaving DAP for MCA
In early January 2021, there were rumours that he and Leong were leaving DAP to join the opposing Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA), a component party of the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition but they both denied. To reaffirm his denial, he signed a statutory declaration (SD) to serve as a DAP MLA for full term.[4][5]
Leaving DAP to contest in the 2022 general election as an independent candidate
Two days before the Nomination Day of the 2022 general election and 2022 Perak state election on 3 November 2022, he left DAP after the party decided not to nominate him as a candidate in both the general election and the state election. He also announced his candidacy to contest for the Taiping federal seat as an independent candidate and called on Taiping voters to give him a chance to do more for Taiping. He explained that he left the party out of "desperation" to bring greater development to the area and to raise the standard of living of the Taiping people. He also hoped that voters would consider voting based on the performance of candidates instead of voting based on party lines. He faced his former party comrade and caretaker Member of Parliament (MP) for Ipoh Timor Wong Kah Woh who was nominated by DAP and PH to contest for the Taiping seat in the election. He also thanked DAP for nominating him to contest for the Aulong and Pokok Assam state seats in the 2013 and 2018 Perak state elections.[6] He lost the election to Wong by a minority of 45,944 votes, garnering only 1,154 votes, which is 1.36% of the total votes and losing the deposit of RM 10,000. For the deposit to be refunded, he has to garner at least 10,597 votes, which is 12.5% of the total votes.
Election results
Perak State Legislative Assembly[7][8]
| Year
|
Constituency
|
Candidate
|
Votes
|
Pct
|
Opponent(s)
|
Votes
|
Pct
|
Ballots cast
|
Majority
|
Turnout
|
| 2013
|
N18 Aulong
|
|
Leow Thye Yih (DAP)
|
14,843
|
65.73%
|
|
Soo Kay Ping (GERAKAN)
|
7,513
|
33.35%
|
22,896
|
7,330
|
80.50%
|
|
|
Yew Tian Hoe (Independent)
|
225
|
0.98%
|
| 2018
|
N17 Pokok Assam
|
|
Leow Thye Yih (DAP)
|
16,954
|
75.66%
|
|
Lee Li Kuan (MCA)
|
4,922
|
21.96%
|
22,409
|
12,032
|
78.38%
|
| 2022
|
|
Leow Thye Yih (Independent)
|
786
|
3.17%
|
|
Ong Seng Guan (DAP)
|
16,726
|
67.36%
|
24,829
|
12,180
|
68.00%
|
|
|
Shariful Juhari Abu Kassim (BERSATU)
|
4,546
|
18.31%
|
|
|
Ang Sui Eng (MCA)
|
2,660
|
10.71%
|
|
|
Mohd Yusoff Abdul Hamid (Independent)
|
111
|
0.45%
|
External links
Leow Thye Yih on Facebook
References
