KUALA SELANGOR, June 4 — Datuk Mohd Amar Nik Abdullah, Idris Ahmad, and Datuk Iskandar Abdul Ismail were made PAS vice-presidents tonight, completing a landslide victory for the party’s top posts by the pro-clergy, or ulama, faction.

Their win saw incumbents Datuk Husam Musa and Salahuddin Ayub knocked out of the race, including former vice-president and 2015 hopeful Datuk Mahfuz Omar.

All three of victors were in the candidates list endorsed by the powerful Ulama wing released in its muktamar, or annual congress on Wednesday.

A total of 1,162 delegates out of the 1,189 present voted, with one unreturned ballot and one spoilt vote.

The result was announced by PAS elections director Asmuni Awi just after midnight, over five hours after voting was closed at 7pm.

Earlier, it was announced that incumbent PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang sailed to an easy win past challenger former vice-president Ahmad Awang, in what was the first open contest for the party’s highest post in over half a decade.

Abdul Hadi beat Ahmad by snapping up 928 votes over the latter’s 233 votes and will now continue to head the Islamist party for at least two more years.

Meanwhile, former vice-president Datuk Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man, also a known leader of the conservative faction, edged out Mohamad Sabu from the PAS deputy presidency, giving the clergy class or ulama, clean control of the party’s highest posts.

Tuan Ibrahim beat popular speaker and Pakatan Rakyat (PR) stalwart Mohamad, also known as Mat Sabu, by snapping up 881 votes to the latter’s 279.

The win by PAS’s conservative faction, particularly Abdul Hadi’s victory, casts a spotlight again on the Islamist party’s already strained relationship with PR ally DAP.

PAS and DAP’s open squabble over hudud has repeatedly led to talk of an imminent split in the federal opposition pact, now said to be held together by PKR and a political agreement that some in PAS now want reviewed.