NIBONG TEBAL, July 6 — Nine polling centres with 65 voting streams opened simultaneously at 8am today for the Sungai Bakap state by-election.

They are at Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan (SMK) Tasek; Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan Cina (SJKC) Boon Beng; SMK Bandar Tasek Mutiara, Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Seri Tasek; SK Sungai Duri; SMK Tun Syed Sheh Barakbah; SK Sungai Bakap; SK Jawi and SK Sungai Kechil.

All the polling centres will be closed at 6pm. The vote tallying will be at the Jawi Multipurpose Hall, Taman Desa Jawi here.

The Election Commission (SPR) appointed 552 officers for the by-election, while 800 policemen were deployed for polling day duty.

The by-election is a straight fight between Pakatan Harapan (PH) candidate Joohari Ariffin and Nibong Tebal PAS vice-chief Abidin Ismail, who is contesting as Perikatan Nasional (PN) candidate.

Joohari, however, will not be voting as he is a registered voter in Sungai Acheh, one of the three state seats in the Nibong Tebal parliamentary constituency.

Abidin will cast his vote at the polling centre at SK Sungai Duri.

The seat fell vacant following the death of incumbent Nor Zamri Latiff of PAS on May 24 due to stomach inflammation.

A total of 39,279 voters, including 57 members of the police force, are eligible to vote in the by-election.

However, no early voting was held for this by-election as the early voters, comprising the 57 police personnel, applied to vote as postal voters.

In the Penang State Election last August, Nor Zamri, who was also Nibong Tebal PAS chief, defeated PH candidate Nurhidayah Che Rose with a majority of 1,563 votes. — Bernama