KUALA LUMPUR, May 8 — PAS’ inability to improve its support in the Rompin by-election despite making hudud a key campaign issue indicates that Malay voters were more invested in their own livelihoods than the Islamic penal law, according to political analysts.

PAS’ candidate, 40-year-old Islamic law graduate Nazri Ahmad, bagged 14,901 votes, 25 fewer than the previous contender in Election 2013 despite riding on growing public discontent over inflation triggered by the Barisan Nasional (BN) government's introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Expecting to make inroads among the 80 per cent Muslim voters there, PAS had trotted out its hudud plans in Kelantan during the later leg of its Rompin campaign.

But analysts said data from the polling results showed that majority of the Malays were simply uninterested.

"Obviously hudud may be a big issue within the PAS camp and its supporters, but for majority of the Malays it is definitely unimportant if you look at the Rompin results," political analyst with Universiti Teknologi Mara Shaharuddin Badaruddin told Malay Mail Online.

"The bigger issue is definitely GST," he added.

While PAS did not advance its position, BN had its majority almost halved from the 13th general election. Umno's Datuk Hasan Arifin won with a majority of 8,895 votes while his predecessor, the late Tan Sri Jamaluddin Jarjis retained the seat for BN after defeating Dewan Muslimat PAS chief Nuridah Mohd Salleh with a majority of 15,114 votes.

"I believe the anger towards the GST drove many Umno to abstain from voting," Shaharuddin commented further.

Political analyst with Universiti Malaya Datuk Mohamad Abu Bakar concurred that the results of the Rompin polls had more to say about the GST than it did hudud, but PAS' failure to improve its votes tally was also telling of the apathy towards the Islamic penal law debate.

"Although many did silently protested the by not voting, we still did not see Umno voters voting for PAS… this is may indicate that majority of the Malays feel hudud is not that important," he told Malay Mail Online.

But Mohamad noted that loyalty among Umno supporters could have played a role in preventing the party's followers from swinging towards PAS, particularly in the areas owned by the Federal Land Development Agency (Felda) that form a large portion of the Rompin constituency.

"A big majority of the Rompin electorate are Felda settlers and owners so they are very loyal to BN so the loyalty factor may play a big part in why they did not vote for PAS," he said.

But the UM professor agreed that this was still indication of the inefficacy of hudud as a campaign platform even in Malay majority areas.

"To them, whether or not hudud is there, it does not matter".

Fighting its own decay, PAS again revived its hudud ambition in an apparent bid to recapture the Malay votes, passing in the Kelantan state assembly in which it dominates the Shariah Criminal Code (II) (1993) 2015 Enactment on March 19 with 31 votes from PAS lawmakers supported by 12 from Umno.

A survey in the Malay heartlands across the country by Malay Mail Online last year had also indicated that the Malay community was more concerned with the rising cost of living instead of hudud, with some accusing PAS of "getting its priorities wrong".

PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang, however, has insisted that hudud is more pressing than economic issues.

Despite opposition from allies in Pakatan Rakyat, Hadi had submitted a private member’s Bill to Parliament to remove the legal obstacles that prevent the enforcement of hudud in Kelantan, which requires bipartisan support from Umno and others to pass.

The Bill did not make it into the April sitting’s agenda, however, and PAS has since confirmed that the party will again seek to table it in May.