The 2020 Kimanis by-election is a by-election held on 18 January 2020 for the

Dewan Rakyat The Dewan Rakyat (English: 'House of Representatives'; ) is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament, the federal legislature of Malaysia. The chamber and its powers are established by Article 44 of the Constitution of Malaysia. The Dewan Ra ...

seat of

Kimanis Kimanis (Chinese: 金馬利) is a town and also a parliamentary constituency in Papar District, West Coast Division of Sabah, Malaysia. It is located approximately 45 kilometres south of the city of Kota Kinabalu, halfway between Papar and B ...

. The seat was declared vacant after the Federal Court on 2 December 2019 upheld the Election Court's ruling earlier on 16 August, nullifying the sitting Member of Parliament (MP),

Anifah Aman Anifah bin Haji Aman @ Haniff Amman ( Jawi: عنيفه بن أمان @ حنيف أمان; born 16 November 1953) is a Malaysian politician. Presently he is the President of Love Sabah Party (PCS). He formerly had served as the Minister of Forei ...

's victory in the 2018 general election (GE14). Anifah was the former

Minister of Foreign Affairs A foreign affairs minister or minister of foreign affairs (less commonly minister for foreign affairs) is generally a cabinet minister in charge of a state's foreign policy and relations. The formal title of the top official varies between cou ...

from 2009 to 2018 and formerly a member of

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 ...

(UMNO) part of the

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 ...

(BN) coalition until he left to become

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

, despite the fact that he had been a 4-term MP for Kimanis since 2004 and had just retained the seat under BN in the 2018 election a few months prior. The

Election Commission An election commission is a body charged with overseeing the implementation of electioneering process of any country. The formal names of election commissions vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and may be styled an electoral commission, a c ...

(EC) had set the nomination day on 4 January, early voting on 14 January and polling day for 18 January 2020 with a 14-day campaign period. The electoral roll in the parliamentary constituency to be used would be the one up to the third quarter of 2019 which was last updated on 9 December 2019 with a total of 29,664 voters made up of 52,698 ordinary voters, 9 early voters while 1 absentee voters (who are abroad).

which consists of the

Bongawan Bongawan is a town in the West Coast Division of the state of Sabah in Malaysia. It is situated within the parliamentary constituency of Kimanis. The town center is 3 kilometers inland from the South China Sea and approximately 70 kilometers sou ...

and

Membakut Membakut is a subdistrict in the Interior Division, Sabah, Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states an ...

state seats, has about 68% Muslim-bumiputras voters of mainly

Bruneian Malay The Brunei Malay language, or Kedayan (, Jawi alphabet, Jawi: ) is the most widely spoken language in Brunei and a lingua franca in some parts of East Malaysia, Sarawak and Sabah, such as Labuan, Limbang, Lawas, Sipitang and Papar.Clynes, A. (20 ...

Bisaya Visayans ( Visayan: ''mga Bisaya''; ) or Visayan people are a Philippine ethnolinguistic group or metaethnicity native to the Visayas, the southernmost islands of Luzon and a significant portion of Mindanao. When taken as a single ethnic group, ...

and

Bajau The Sama-Bajau include several Austronesian ethnic groups of Maritime Southeast Asia. The name collectively refers to related people who usually call themselves the Sama or Samah (formally A'a Sama, "Sama people"); or are known by the exonym ...

communities, some 25% non-Muslim bumiputras voters of mainly ethnic

Kadazan-Dusun Kadazan-Dusun (also written as Kadazandusun or Mamasok Kadazan-Dusun) also less-known as "Mamasok Sabah" are two indigenous peoples of Sabah, Malaysia—the ethnic groups Kadazan and Dusun. The Kadazandusun is the largest native group of Bumip ...

and

Murut Murut may refer to: * Murut people The Murut are an indigenous ethnic group, comprising 29 sub-ethnic groups inhabiting the northern inland regions of Borneo. The Murutic languages are a family of half a dozen closely related Austronesian lan ...

, while the remaining 7% were

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

and others.

Nomination

On 11 December 2019, Sabah

Pakatan Harapan The Alliance of Hope ( ms, Pakatan Harapan; abbrev: PH; stylized as HARAPAN) is a Malaysian political coalition consisting of centre-left political parties which was formed in 2015 to succeed the Pakatan Rakyat coalition. It has been the r ...

(PH) Chairman and Deputy Chief Minister

Christina Liew Datuk Christina Liew (also known as Liew Chin Jin; ) (born 14 September 1952) is a Hong Kong-born Malaysian politician who has served as the State Minister of Tourism, Culture and Environment of Sabah for the second term in the Gabungan Rakya ...

said that PH will pave way and support ally,

Sabah Heritage Party The Heritage Party ( ms, Parti Warisan or Warisan) is a multi-racial political party in Malaysia which was rebranded and renamed from the Sabah Heritage Party ( ms, Parti Warisan Sabah), a Sabah-based party led by Shafie Apdal formed earlier on ...

(WARISAN) to field its candidate. Previously, the

Malaysian United Indigenous Party The Malaysian United Indigenous Party ( ms, Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia), abbreviated BERSATU or PPBM, is a nationalist political party in Malaysia. The party was preceded by the United Indigenous Association of Malaysia (). It is a major c ...

(BERSATU) had offered to contest the by-election but decided to support the WARISAN candidate instead. Karim Bujang, the WARISAN candidate for Kimanis in GE14 who had lost and filed the election petition, was once again nominated as WARISAN's candidate for the by-election. Sabah UMNO chief,

Bung Mokhtar Radin Datuk Seri Panglima Bung Moktar bin Radin (born 14 September 1958) is a Malaysian politician who has served as the Deputy Chief Minister I and State Minister of Works of Sabah from 2020 to 2023. He has also served as the Member of Parliamen ...

confirmed that BN will contest the by-election by fielding a candidate from UMNO. BN decided to field UMNO Kimanis division chief and former Bongawan assemblyman,

Mohamad Alamin Mohamad bin Haji Alamin ( Jawi: داتوق محمد بن حج الأمين) is a Malaysian politician who has served as the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Pakatan Harapan (PH) administration under Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and Mi ...

as their candidate for the by-election. The

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 ...

(PAS) has announced its support for the BN candidate in the by-election. PAS secretary-general,

Takiyuddin Hassan Takiyuddin bin Haji Hassan (Jawi alphabet, Jawi: تقي الدين بن حاج حسن; born 24 November 1961) is a Malaysian people, Malaysian politician from the Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), a component party of the Perikatan Nasional (PN) ...

, said that the party will mobilise its election campaign machinery to support the BN candidate.

, the incumbent prior to the disqualification, denied that he will contest the seat again. Anifah also said that he will return in the coming 15th General Election instead. Anifah has since declared his support for the BN candidate in the by-election. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP),

Homeland Solidarity Party Homeland Solidarity Party (STAR; ms, Parti Solidariti Tanah Airku ) is a Sabah-based political party. The party was founded on 1 July 2016 by Datuk Seri Panglima Dr. Jeffrey G. Kitingan. He is Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan's younger brothe ...

(STAR),

United Sabah National Organisation The United Sabah National Organisation ( ms, Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Sabah Bersatu; abbrev: USNO) was a political party in North Borneo and later Sabah, Malaysia. The widely known Sabah's Muslim indigenous especially Suluk-Bajau ethnic based pa ...

(USNO Baru),

Sabah Progressive Party The Sabah Progressive Party ( ms, Parti Maju Sabah, abbreviated SAPP) is a multiracial political party based in Sabah, Malaysia. It was registered on 21 January 1994 by dissidents led by former Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Yong Teck Lee from Uni ...

(SAPP) and the

Sabah United Party The United Sabah Party ( ms, Parti Bersatu Sabah, abbreviated PBS) is a political party of Sabah. The PBS was founded by Joseph Pairin Kitingan in 1985 and it is Sabah's oldest local party. In August 2020, PBS confirmed that they would be using ...

(PBS) have declined to contest the by-election, paving the way for a possible straight fight between BN and Warisan. On Nomination Day, BN's

and WARISAN's Karim Bujang filed their nomination papers, setting the stage for a two-cornered fight for the parliamentary seat.

Controversies and issues

The main issues in the by-election are not national matters but local issues such as the Sabah Temporary Pass or ''Pas Sementara Sabah'' (PSS) for Filipino refugees immigrants, bread-and-butter and job opportunities issues.

Election results

Results according to polling districts

Previous result

References

{{Authority control 2020 elections in Malaysia By-elections in Malaysia Elections in Sabah January 2020 events in Malaysia