By Sarah Hafizah Chandra & Fasiha Kushairi
KUCHING: Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof has cast his vote for the Petra Jaya parliamentary constituency at the SK Rakyat Jalan Haji Bolhassan polling station here this morning (Nov 19).
The Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) candidate for Petra Jaya arrived at the voting centre here at 8am, dressed in a white collar shirt and black pants.
He was accompanied by his wife Datin Seri Ruziah Mohd Tahir who wore a red baju kurung.
He completed his duty to vote at 8:30am and expressed gratitude for the good weather and hoped it would remain for the rest of the day so that the voter turnout would be high.
“Alhamdulillah, this election period has been going well, I hope that many people will come out and cast their vote today. There was a bit of a hiccup at my voting channel two, but I believe they have addressed it, so everything is going smoothly now.
“I would also like to thank the Election Commission (EC) and People’s Volunteers Corps (RELA) among others who are on duty to ensure today goes well,” he said when met by reporters.
When asked about the campaign period during this election, Fadillah pointed out that GPS and its component parties namely Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB), Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP), Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS) and Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) has always been close with the rakyat.
He reiterated that state leaders do not merely wait for election period to come around to approach the rakyat.
“We are very fortunate that all levels of society are able to benefit from our premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg’s inclusive initiatives. This has contributed to the strong and solid support from the people to GPS.
“This strong and solid support was evident in the previous state election where GPS won 76 out of 82 seats, I hope this can be replicated in this 15th general election (GE15),” he said.
Meanwhile, Satok assemblyman Datuk Ibrahim Baki has also cast his vote for the Petra Jaya parliamentary constituency at the SK Rakyat Jalan Haji Bolhassan voting centre.
He arrived at the polling station as early as 9.15am together with his wife, Datin Noor Akmar.
He finished casting his vote at 9.25am on channel two.
The Petra Jaya parliamentary seat saw a three-way competition involving candidates from GPS, Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusuf challenged by Pakatan Harapan (PH) candidate Sophian Junaidi and Datuk Othman Abdillah representing Sarawak People’s Sedar Party (SEDAR).
In the previous general election, Fadillah retained his seat with 29,559 votes defeating PKR candidate, Ahmad Nazib Johari’s 8,116 votes.
