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TANJUNG MALIM, Perak: Barisan Nasional (BN) has retained Slim’s state seat in Perak with a landslide victory in the by-elections on Saturday (August 29).
BN candidate Mohd Zaidi Aziz got 13,060 votes to beat two independent candidates. Lawyer Amir Khusyairi Mohamad Tanusi obtained 2,115 votes, while former teacher S Santharasekaran obtained only 276 votes.
This means that Zaidi won with a majority of 10,945 votes.
Santharasekaran lost his deposit for failing to secure at least one-eighth of the total votes received by the candidates.
READ: Pakatan Harapan and Pejuang de Mahathir have the same aspirations but not ideologies: slim by-choice candidate
According to the teller, voter turnout was 68.4 percent. There were 327 frustrated votes.
A total of 22,749 regular voters were eligible to vote in the by-elections.
Slim’s seat was vacated after his four-term assemblyman, Mohd Khusairi Abdul Talib of BN, died of a heart attack on July 15.
In Malaysia’s 14th general election, Mohd Khusairi won the seat with a majority of 2,183 votes, defeating Mohd Amran Ibrahim of Bersatu, who was running on a PKR ballot, and Muhammad Zulfadli Zainal of PAS.
“It is all thanks to the support and hard work of those involved. This shows that the voters have missed us,” UMNO President Ahmad Zahid Hamidi was quoted as saying by the Star. UMNO is the largest component of BN.
“This (result) will be better interpreted if the state elections of Sabah or GE15 are held. We continue to regain the support of the people,” he added.
Saturday’s poll is the twelfth by-election held after GE14 and the second held amid the COVID-19 pandemic, following the Chini state by-election on July 4.
