By FMT Team

FULL REPORT KUALA KUBU BARU: Barisan Nasional has managed to reclaim the Hulu Selangor parliamentary seat after its candidate P Kamalanathan defeated PKR's Zaid Ibrahim.

The Election Commission announced that Kamalanathan had won the seat with a 1,725 vote-majority.

Kamalanathan garnered 24,997 votes while Zaid polled 23,272.

The victory will provide a boost for Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak, who described the election as a referendum on his leadership and policies.

Najib, who is also the Selangor Umno chief, is bent on recapturing the state in the next general election. Selangor fell into the hands of Pakatan Rakyat in the 2008 polls.

However, the Hulu Selangor seat fell short of BN's targeted 6,000 vote-majority, indicating that the ruling coalition and its chairperson cannot rest on their laurels just as yet.

Prior to losing the “safe seat” in 2008, BN's then four-term MP and MIC deputy president G Palanivel had emerged victorious with thumping victories, surpassing the 10,000 mark.

In his last outing, Palanivel was defeated by PKR's Zainal Ahmad Abidin by a mere 198 votes, which also witnessed the number of protest votes greatly outnumbering the majority.

A by-election was called for the Hulu Selangor seat following Zainal's death on March 25.

Battle for Malay votes

Since the onset, observers had pointed out that BN's "morality" campaign against Zaid, branding him an alcoholic and gambler, would have an impact on Malay voters, who form the majority.

Kamalanathan was also portrayed as a down-to-earth candidate, with the media highlighting his proficiency in Bahasa Malaysia, whereas Zaid, a former law minister, was described as too high profile for the semi-urban constituency, littered with villages and estates.

More than an MIC man, the BN campaign promoted Kamalanathan as a 1Malaysia candidate and the underdog in what some observers had described as a battle between David and Goliath.

While Zaid managed to pull in a significant number of Chinese votes, it was not enough to offset the losses in the Malay-majority areas. Indian votes also appeared to be in favour of BN this time around.

On the other hand, Kamalanathan's victory would see MIC having an additional MP after the party was nearly annihilated in the 2008 general election.

Currently, MIC is represented by Human Resources Minister Dr S Subramaniam (Segamat) and two deputy ministers SK Devamany (Cameron Highlands) and M Saravanan (Tapah).

In the run-up to the Hulu Selangor by-election, the BN leadership and MIC were embroiled in a tussle over who to field.

While MIC wanted Palanivel to run again, the BN leadership, however, insisted that a fresh face stood a better chance.

Following this, a consensus was reached on fielding Kamalanathan at the eleventh hour.

Meanwhile, Pakatan Rakyat supporters were in high spirits in the early stages of the vote count when Zaid was ahead by nearly 2,000 votes.

PAS operations director Jamaliddin Elias had predicted that the PKR candidate would win by more than 500 votes based on the turnout.

Whereas think-tank Zantrum Future Studies expected PKR to garner more than 52.3% support while BN will get 47.7%.