Debating the bill on the constitutional amendment to facilitate the tabling of the anti-hopping law, the Parti Bangsa Malaysia MP said the exemption should be given to independent MPs as they had won through their own efforts and not through any party’s support.

“They did not use any party’s logo, funding or political narrative.

“If we look at the last general election (GE14) results, three independent MPs were elected.

“The (anti-hopping) law is not to protect the party but the people’s mandate. I support this Act, but I hope that an exemption will be given to these independent MPs as their situation is different from MPs fielded by political parties.”

Sng also posed several questions on the proposed anti-hopping law that he said required clarification.

“In GE14, we saw political parties and candidates contesting under borrowed logos.

“If the candidate won under a borrowed logo, what is the status of the candidate? Is he a candidate of his own party or the party whose logo he borrowed?

“This must be clarified so that there is no confusion when they defect,” he said.

Sng also said that if an elected representative is from a party that faces deregistration by the Registrar of Societies (RoS), that person can be considered an independent.

“If his party is considered illegal (under RoS rules), does he need to vacate his seat?

“What if his party decides to merge with other parties for its future survival? What will happen next? Do they have to contest again and return the mandate to the people or are they allowed to merge with other parties?” he asked.