By Shannon Teoh
The Malaysian Insider

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 31 — More than half of Barisan Nasional’s (BN) 1,200-vote gain over PAS in Tenang was due to increased Malay support in the constituency, DAP statistics have shown.

Malays who had in 2008 voted against Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s stewardship of BN or abstained from the general election, came out to signal its support for Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s administration.

The Malays make up about 49 per cent of the 14,753 voters in Tenang. Chinese account for over 38 per cent and Indians, 12 per cent.

Umno’s Azahar Ibrahim received 83.3 per cent of Malay votes, up four percentage points from Election 2008, said DAP publicity chief Tony Pua on Twitter earlier today.

A Malay turnout of 81 per cent yesterday, up two points from 2008, translated to a 700-vote increase.

BN’s 3,707-vote majority was also due to Chinese voters skipping yesterday’s by-election.

Although Normala Sudirman managed to hold on to PAS’s 64 per cent Chinese support from the 2008 general election, an 18-point fall in turnout resulted in another 300-vote gain for BN’s majority.

Despite a 30 per cent increase in Indian votes for BN, less than 40 per cent turned up to vote. The lower Indian turnout meant BN only secured 200-vote increase from the hike in proportions.

Overall, Azahar polled 6,699 votes against Normala, who took 2,992 votes from the 12 polling districts.

A total of 9,833 voters or 67 per cent of the 14,753 electorate turned up to cast their ballots, nearly 1,000 fewer than in 2008.

BN had initially targeted a victory margin of 5,000 votes, similar to Election 2004.

It retained Tenang in 2008 by 2,492 votes.