Marina yesterday announced that she was leaving politics and would not seek re-election in Skudai, a seat she won at the 2022 Johor election with 26,359 votes — more than double her nearest rival’s tally.

Johor DAP had planned to move Marina to contest the Tiram seat in the upcoming Johor state election, with a statutory body post offered should she lose.

Liu, a former Selangor executive councillor who was a DAP member for 41 years, questioned the motive behind such a proposition.

“What sort of practice is this?” he said in a Facebook post.

“Where did DAP learn such a self-serving approach?

“Is this the standard of political culture that DAP wishes to promote today?”

Johor DAP chief Teo Nie Ching yesterday said the party felt that Marina was the “most winnable candidate” for the Tiram seat, and she intended to propose that Marina be made the chairman of a statutory body, regardless of the outcome of the election.

“To assure her that the party would stand by her regardless of the outcome of the Johor election, I also shared my intention to propose her as the chairman of a statutory body, where I believe she could contribute constructively,” said Teo.

Marina joined DAP in 2017 as a member of its Indahpura branch, which she continues to lead as chairman, and was also appointed to the Kulai Municipal Council in 2018.

Liu urged Johor DAP to reflect seriously on how it treated its younger leaders, saying Marina, 38, represented the kind of principled and capable politician the party should be nurturing.

Despite that, he said Marina’s decision to leave politics should be praised and suggested that the offer to chair a statutory body may have been a factor in her departure.

“Perhaps Marina wanted no part in such arrangements.

“If so, her decision to leave quietly and honourably deserves respect,” said Liu, who left DAP in 2023 due to dissatisfaction with the leadership’s move to amend the party’s constitution regarding the termination of memberships.