GE15: KJ urges youths to come out to vote on polling day

Photo: S.S.Kanesan/ The Star

SHAH ALAM: After a week of campaigning for the Sungai Buloh parliamentary seat, Barisan Nasional candidate Khairy Jamaluddin finds many youth voters are taking an interest in the 15th General Election (GE15).

“I hope youth voters, especially first time voters, will go out to vote this GE15,” said Khairy.

He added that this is the first general election since the law was passed to lower the voting age from 21 to 18.

“I hope youth voters will benefit from the legislation amendment and help to decide their future by voting,” said Khairy.

Khairy was speaking after playing a friendly badminton match with former world number one shuttler Datuk Lee Chong Wei at Dewan Badminton Yosin Kampung Subang in Jalan Pekan Subang, U6 Shah Alam on Sunday (Nov 13).

Khairy also said that social media is very important as he may not be able to meet all youth voters, adding that it was impossible to do house-to-house campaigning in urban areas.

He added that he has more than five million followers on his social media accounts.

Khairy, however, also said that he has received invitations from resident groups to engage with them.

“Even if I’m unable to meet everyone in one neighbourhood, at least I’ve been able to meet resident association representatives and have a dialogue session with them,” he added.

Asked if Lee’s presence would help with his GE15 campaigning and attract more youth voters, Khairy said; “Chong Wei is a national hero. I’m thankful that he’s come down to help me out.”

Lee later said that he came in hopes of encouraging and inspiring more people from the younger generation to play badminton.

“I’m willing to support a sports event, irrespective of whether it’s organised by Barisan Nasional or Pakatan Harapan, as long as my schedule allows it,” said the shuttler who was mobbed by fans for photographs.

According to the Election Commission’s website, there are 158,090 registered voters in Sungai Buloh,15,242 or 9.6% of whom are aged between 18 and 20.

This makes Sungai Buloh the constituency with the most proportion of young voters aged 18 to 20 in Selangor and third highest in Malaysia, after Tebrau, Johor and Pensiangan, Sabah.

Seven candidates are vying for the Sungai Buloh seat in this 15th General Election.

Besides Khairy, the other candidate hopefuls are Ramanan Ramakrishnan (Pakatan Harapan - PKR), Mohd Ghazali Md Hamin (Perikatan Nasional - PAS), Mohd Akmal Mohd Yusoff (Gerakan Tanah Air - Pejuang), Ahmad Jufliz Faiza (Parti Rakyat Malaysia) as well as Independent candidates Syed Razak Alsagoff and Nurhaslinda Basri (Sifu Linda).