GEORGE TOWN, May 25 — The Bukit Gelugor by-election scored one of the lowest voter turnouts in recent years at only 56.04 per cent, Election Commission chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof said today.
Only 46,099 out of 82,283 registered voters cast their votes today, he told reporters at the Dewan Sri Pinang counting centre here.
“The reason for the low turnout could be due to several factors, one of which is because Barisan Nasional (BN) is not contesting in this by-election,” he said.
He said due to BN not contesting, voters probably assumed that it is a sure-win for DAP so they did not bother to come out to vote today.
“Another reason could be that BN supporters did not come out to vote because BN is not contesting,” he said.
He also believed voters working outstation did not come back to vote, also due to assumptions that DAP will surely win so there is no need for them to come back.
“The weather has been fine the whole day so we can't blame the weather and we chose a Sunday so we can't say people are working,” he said.
The turnout for the by-election is the worst by far as the turnout for other recent by-elections were quite high at 80 per cent for Kuala Besut, 85 per cent for Sungai Limau, 72 per cent for Kajang and 72 per cent for Balingan.
The by-election is also one of the most peaceful and incident-free ones, Abdul Aziz said.
“There was no provocation by any party at polling stations, there were no party supporters or any commotion at any polling station and there were no party supporters trying to pull votes at any polling station so this is by far, the most peaceful by-election in recent times,” he said.
It is a four corner fight for the Bukit Gelugor parliamentary seat between DAP's Ramkarpal Singh Deo, Parti Cinta Malaysia's Huan Cheng Guan and independent candidates Mohd Nabi Bux Mohd Sathar and Abu Backer Sidek Mohammad Zan.
The EC is expected to announce the results by 9pm.
