MALAYSIAN POLLS: MAHATHIR CLAIMS WIN
SLIM LEAD FOR PRIME MINISTER NAJIB
KUALALUMPUR: Malaysia’s Mahathir Mohamad said the opposition alliance he leads had won enough Parliament seats in Wednesday’s general election to form the next government, but the count was still on and official results were awaited.
The Election Commission said some results that had gone “viral” were unofficial.
“Of course, political parties can declare whoever (they believe has won), but ... please wait,” commission chairman Mohd Hashim Abdullah said. “We would like to announce it as quickly as possible as well.”
At the time of going to print, official results showed 92-yearold Mahathir’s Pakatan Harapan had won 52 of parliament’s 222 seats and Prime Minister Najib Razak’s ruling Barisan Nasional coalition had won 42. But unofficial results showed the opposition alliance was making strong gains at the expense of Najib’s coalition. At least two cabinet ministers lost their seats. Incomplete unofficial counts showed the opposition had 96 seats to the ruling coalition’s 68.
A simple majority in the Parliament is 112 . “We believe that from our official counting that they’re left far behind,” Mahathir told reporters.
Early results showed that Barisan Nasional lost seats in key states that have traditionally been its strongholds, raising the prospect that it could be voted out for the first time in the country’s six decades of independence from Britain.
Najib faced a huge challenge because of public anger over the multi-billion-dollar scandal 1MBD scandal. AGENCIES