NIBONG TEBAL: The voting process for the Sungai Bakap state by-election concluded after all nine polling centres, which opened at 8am, officially closed at 6pm.
The voting centres involved were Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan (SMK) Tasek, Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan Cina (SJKC) Boon Beng, SMK Bandar Tasek Mutiara, Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Seri Tasek, SK Sungai Duri, SMK Tun Syed Sheh Barakbah, SK Sungai Bakap, SK Jawi and SK Sungai Kechil.
Immediately after closing, all ballot boxes from the 65 voting streams were transported to the official vote tallying centre at Dewan Serbaguna Jawi near here.
As of 4 pm, 57.7 per cent of the 39,151 registered voters had cast their ballots to elect a new representative for the Sungai Bakap state constituency.
In total, 39,279 registered voters were eligible to vote in this by-election, including 57 members of the police force. However, no early voting centres were opened, despite the date being set for July 2 after the EC issued 128 postal ballots to eligible postal voters.
The by-election is a straight fight between Pakatan Harapan candidate Dr Joohari Ariffin and Nibong Tebal PAS vice-chief Abidin Ismail, representing Perikatan Nasional.
The seat fell vacant following the death of incumbent Nor Zamri Latiff of PAS on May 24 due to stomach inflammation.- Bernama
