Polling centre holds special meaning for Pejuang’s Padang Serai hopeful

ALOR SETAR: Pejuang’s Padang Serai parliamentary candidate Hamzah Abdul Rahman cast his vote at SK Bukit Selarong on Wednesday (Dec 7) morning.

Clad in a light green baju Melayu complete with traditional headgear, he arrived at the polling centre at 8.20am accompanied by his aide.

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Hamzah, 59, is contesting for the first time. He faces Datuk Azman Nasrudin from Perikatan Nasional, Dr Mohamad Sofee Razak from Pakatan Harapan and Independent Sreanandha Rao in a four-cornered fight.

Speaking to the press at the polling centre, Hamzah said voting at SK Bukit Selarong is special for him as he studied there from Standard One to Six in the 1970s.

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“Being here makes me sad and proud because this school is where I started my life,” he said.

He was also positive about how polling proceeded on Wednesday after it was postponed from the original GE15 date of Nov 19.

“After being able to campaign for 13 days from Nov 5 to Nov 18 and an additional campaigning period of 11 days before this, I think I have (conveyed) my message to the voters here,” he said.

Voting was postponed following the death of incumbent M. Karupaiya of Pakatan three days before GE15.

The constituency in Kedah has 133,870 voters, 68,284 female and 65,586 male.

The majority are between 21 and 30 years old (29.1%), followed by those 31 to 40 (19.7%).

There are 83,841 Malay voters (62.6%), followed by 25,687 Indian voters (19.2%), 23,600 Chinese (17.6%) and 742 others (0.6%).