{"id":28891,"date":"2017-03-24T22:14:22","date_gmt":"2017-03-24T14:14:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/direct.imoney.my\/articles\/?p=28891"},"modified":"2017-04-17T16:56:23","modified_gmt":"2017-04-17T08:56:23","slug":"independent-candidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate","title":{"rendered":"How To Run For Politics As An Independent Candidate"},"content":{"rendered":"

About 270 independent candidates contested the 13th<\/sup> general election, making it the most number of unaffiliated hopefuls vying for a shot at top-level politics.<\/p>\n

But all of them lost, with 266 candidates losing their deposits as they failed to secure one-eighth of the votes cast. Needless to say, many did feel the burn.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing independent is actually stupid. There is no way I got into this with the hope of winning in the first place. If that was my intention, I am just extra stupid. The system doesn\u2019t allow it. You can\u2019t win,\u201d says Mak Khuin Weng.<\/p>\n

He should know. Mak was among the 266 who lost their deposits after running for the Bukit Gasing state assembly seat in GE13. Rajiv Rishyakaran of DAP won that contest.<\/p>\n

But what motivated him to campaign despite the uphill battle?<\/p>\n

\u201cI threw away about RM30,000 for a point. I wanted to raise awareness on an issue that affected a lot of people in a particular constituency,\u201d Mak tells iMoney.<\/p>\n

He campaigned for grassroots problems such as land titles wrongly given out in thousands of homes in Petaling Jaya and developmental rules which were not followed by municipal councils.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore I went on this route, I went to the media with this story and not a lot of people picked it up. I even went on BFM but the response wasn\u2019t there. This was a last-ditch effort.\u201d<\/p>\n

But despite the loss, Mak does not regret his decision. \u201cI spent the money for an experience. It\u2019s no different from you going on a holiday.\u201d<\/p>\n

On how he would rate himself, he believes he did what he could do with the resources he had and the obstacles he faced.<\/p>\n

And was it worth the money?<\/p>\n

\u201cI got people to interview me. It generated media. I paid for advertising and if I looked at it that way, I got a lot more coverage than just buying an ad.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd it is still paying dividends\u2026 because you are interviewing me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nobody said it was easy. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":28905,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[312,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-career","category-infographic"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHere's What You Need To Know About Being An Independent Candidate<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In Malaysia, politics is no joke. If political parties have left you disappointed, your best bet for change would be to do it yourself.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Here's What You Need To Know About Being An Independent Candidate\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Nobody said it was easy.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"iMoney Malaysia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-03-24T14:14:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-04-17T08:56:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.imoney.my\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/indie-candidate-cropped-c.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"272\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Emmanuel Surendra\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Emmanuel Surendra\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate\",\"name\":\"Here's What You Need To Know About Being An Independent Candidate\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/independent-candidate#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/indie-candidate-cropped-c.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-03-24T14:14:22+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-04-17T08:56:23+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.imoney.my\/articles\/#\/schema\/person\/a7c6c5ecf3ba99234373c75acdff7fa4\"},\"description\":\"In Malaysia, politics is no joke. 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