THE Election Commission (EC) has announced that the election for the Padang Serai parliamentary seat has been postponed to Dec 7 following the recent demise of one of its contenders, Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) M. Karupaiya.
According to EC chairman chairman Tan Sri Abdul Ghani Salleh, nomination day will be on Nov 24 while early voting will take place on Dec 3, adding that there will be no polling for Padang Serai tomorrow which is when the rest of the country goes to polls in the 15th general election (GE15).
The nomination process on Nov 24 will take place at the Dewan Kompleks Sukan Kulim Hi-Tech, Kulim.
Meanwhile, the applications for domestic and international postal voting online are open starting today (Nov 18) until Nov 22 (Tuesday).
“All qualified candidates who have been verified previously are required to be present at the nomination centre to draw their number on the ballot paper,” Abdul Ghani said.
“New candidates who wish to contest in the GE15 election for Padang Serai have to hand over their completed nomination papers on nomination day.”
There are 133,867 voters in Padang Serai, involving 133,776 normal voters, 76 police, and 15 overseas absent voters.
Karupaiya won the seat in the last election by an 8,813-vote majority against Muhamad Sobri Osman from PAS and Datuk Dr Leong Yong Kong from Barisan Nasional (BN).
Karupaiya was supposed to face six-cornered clashes in this election against BN candidate Datuk C. Sivarraajh, Hamzah Abd Rahman (Pejuang), Datuk Azman Nasrudin (Perikatan Nasional), Mohd Bakhri Hashim (Warisan) and Ananda AK (independent).
However, Karupaiya collapsed on the campaign trail on Monday (Nov 14) and died at the Kulim Hospital the following day.
The businessperson and former military officer was 69 years old. – Nov 18, 2022
