Polling Begins In Galas, Batu Sapi By-Elections

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 4 (Bernama) -- Polling for the Galas state by-election in Gua Musang, Kelantan and Batu Sapi parliamentary by-election in Sandakan, Sabah, began at 8am today.
In Galas, Dr Zulkefli Mohamed of PAS is locked in a straight fight against Barisan Nasional's (BN) Abdul Aziz Yusoff.
Batu Sapi is seeing a three-way fight involving Datin Linda Tsen Thau Lin of BN, Datuk Yong Teck Lee of Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) and Ansari Abdullah of Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR).
Voters have begun queuing up at polling centres in both constituencies.
Galas has 11,553 voters and 13 polling centres with the vote tallying to be carried out at Gua Musang civic centre.
The weather was fine in Galas in the morning but according to the Malaysian Meteorological Department, there would be rain in the afternoon.
The Galas by-election is called following the death of its incumbent, Chek Hashim Sulaima, 46, of PAS on Sept 27.
Meanwhile, ten polling centres have been opened in Batu Sapi.
Two remote polling centres, namely Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Pulau Timbang with 984 voters and SK Segaliud with 785 voters will be closed much earlier at 3pm and 4pm respectively.
A total of 24,047 electorates -- 15,099 or 59.2 per cent of them are Muslim Bumiputera, 689 or 2.69 per cent non-Muslim Bumiputera, 9,737 or 38.06 per cent Chinese and 57 or 0.22 per cent other races -- are eligible to vote in Batu Sapi.
Postal voters had cast theirs on Tuesday and yesterday.
The vote tallying will be carried out at Sandakan community hall.
The seat fell vacant following the death of its incumbent Datuk Edmund Chong Ket Wah of PBS on Oct 9.
Polling closes at 5pm while the results can be expected at around 8pm, according to the Election Commission.

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