A by-election was held for the Terengganu State Assembly seat of

Kuala Besut Kuala Besut is a mukim in Besut District, Terengganu, Malaysia. It is the departure point for boats to the Perhentian Islands. There are a variety of tour operators that tourist can choose for getting to Perhentian Islands. Small shops sellin ...

on 24 July 2013 with nomination day on 12 July 2013. The seat of

fell vacant after the death of incumbent assemblyman, A. Rahman Mokhtar on 26 June 2013 from lung cancer. Dr. Mokhtar was an assemblyman from the

United Malays National Organisation The United Malays National Organisation (Malay: ; Jawi: ; abbreviated UMNO () or less commonly PEKEMBAR), is a nationalist right-wing political party in Malaysia. As the oldest continuous national political party within Malaysia (since its in ...

, a component party of the ruling

Barisan Nasional The National Front ( ms, Barisan Nasional; abbrev: BN) is a political coalition of Malaysia that was founded in 1973 as a coalition of centre-right and right-wing political parties. It is also the third largest political coalition with 30 se ...

coalition, which holds a 1-seat majority into the by-election. The

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

was contested by Tengku Zaihan Che Ku Abdul Rahman from

UMNO The United Malays National Organisation (Malay: ; Jawi: ; abbreviated UMNO () or less commonly PEKEMBAR), is a nationalist right-wing political party in Malaysia. As the oldest continuous national political party within Malaysia (since its in ...

and Azlan Yusof, who hails from the

Pakatan Rakyat The People's Alliance ( ms, Pakatan Rakyat; abbrev: PR) was an informal Malaysian political coalition and successor to Barisan Alternatif (BA). The political coalition was formed by the People's Justice Party (PKR), Democratic Action Party (DAP ...

component

Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party The Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS; ms, Parti Islam Se-Malaysia; ms, ڤرتي إسلام سمليسيا, label=Jawi alphabet, Jawi, script=arab, italic=unset) is an Islamist political party in Malaysia. As the party focused on Islamic fundamen ...

. This by-election is viewed as critical by both the government and opposition. A win by

would have resulted in a

hung parliament A hung parliament is a term used in legislatures primarily under the Westminster system to describe a situation in which no single political party or pre-existing coalition (also known as an alliance or bloc) has an absolute majority of legisl ...

with both coalition holding 16 seats, and potentially a fresh state election. The by-election was won by BN's Tengku Zaihan with a slightly increased majority, thus keeping the government's wafer-thin 2-seat majority. Turnout in this by-election dropped by 7% compared to the turnout during the general election two months before.

Results

References

{{Malaysian elections Politics of Terengganu 2013 elections in Malaysia 2013 Kuala Besut by-election Elections in Terengganu