Kemaman polls: EC has five teams monitoring campaign

KEMAMAN: The Election Commission (EC) has set up five campaign enforcement teams to monitor the activities of candidates in the parliamentary by-election here.

EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Ghani Salleh reminded the candidates that campaign methods and materials should not be malicious or inflame feelings of dissatisfaction and animosity and should not touch on sensitive issues, including race, religion and royalty (3R).

He said candidates should also abide by local authority bylaws regarding the display and distribution of campaign materials containing their photographs, symbols/party symbols and photographs of leaders of their parties or component parties.

"There is no limit on photographs for contesting parties and photographs of leaders of component political parties/coalitions in election campaign materials,” he said in a statement today.

After the announcement of candidates for the by-election on Saturday (Nov 18) the campaign is now on and will end at 11.59 pm on Dec 1.

The EC has fixed Nov 28 for early voting and Dec 2 for polling.

The by-election is a straight fight between Gen (Rtd) Tan Sri Raja Mohamed Affandi Raja Mohamed Noor of Barisan Nasional (BN) and Terengganu Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar, representing PAS.

A total of 141,790 electors are eligible to vote in the by-election, including 387 police personnel, nine military personnel and 12 overseas absent voters.

The by-election was called after the Terengganu Election Court on Sept 26 this year nullified the victory of PAS candidate Che Alias Hamid in the 15th general election (GE15).

In GE15, Che Alias won with a majority of 27,179 votes when he polled 65,714 votes, beating Terengganu UMNO chairman Datuk Seri Ahmad Said (BN, 38,535 votes), Hasuni Sudin (Pakatan Harapan, 8,340 votes) and Rosli Ab Ghani (Pejuang, 506 votes). - Bernama