Tag: Semenyih

null On Saturday, after a 14-day campaign period, Barisan Nasional’s candidate – Zakaria Hanafi of the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) – won the seat for Semenyih, a state constituency in Selangor, by 1,914 votes. He beat the Pakatan Harapan candidate – Muhammad Aiman Zanali of the Malaysian United Indigenous Party (Bersatu) – and two independents. Mahathir’s ruling coalition loses seat in Malaysia by-election His victory meant Semenyih, about 20km from Kuala Lumpur, became the first constituency to have been flipped by the Barisan Nasional since the Pakatan Harapan toppled it from power in May after more than six decades of uninterrupted rule. “In [the last elections], Barisan and PAS won a total of 46.43 per cent of votes, while Pakatan Harapan won with 50.76 per cent. In the by-election, Barisan backed by PAS won 50.44 per cent while Pakatan won only 45.56 per cent. In May, the Barisan Nasional lost the seat to Pakatan Harapan’s Bakhtiar Mohd Nor, who won with a majority of almost 9,000 votes. Although this is not Barisan’s first post-election victory (it retained the seat of Cameron Highlands in another by-election in January), observers say Semenyih is one of the most telling by-elections since the Pakatan Harapan took over. Although Pakatan Harapan managed to retain most of the ethnic Indian and Chinese vote – the other two main racial groups in Malaysia – it yielded the Malay vote, which is about 68 per cent of the constituency. “There is clearly unrest about how Pakatan is governing, both in terms of the economy and the unnecessary provocation of the Malay sentiment,” said Shahril, of Umno Youth, adding that the victory boded well for future Umno-PAS cooperation. Religion, race, politics: what’s causing Malaysia’s great divide?