A NEW chapter was written in the country’s history books when 945 candidates from various parties filed their nomination papers, the highest in the election history, to contest the 222 parliamentary seats in the 15th general election (GE15).

Based on the data displayed at the media centre of the Election Commission (EC) headquarters in Putrajaya, 441 candidates are also contesting the 117 state seats in the polls.

Of the total number of candidates for the parliamentary seats, Pakatan Harapan (PH) has fielded the most number of candidates at 206, followed by Barisan Nasional (BN) (178), Perikatan Nasional (PN) (149), and Pejuang (116).

Other candidates are from Warisan (52), Gabungan Parti Sarawak (31), PAS (22), Parti Rakyat Malaysia (16), Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (13), Parti Sarawak Bersatu (10), Putra (9), DAP (8), Parti Kesejahteraan Demokratik Masyarakat (7), Muda (6), Parti Bangsa Malaysia (5) and Parti Bangsa Dayak Sarawak (3).

In addition, Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah, Parti Sedar Rakyat Sarawak, Parti Sosialis Malaysia, Parti Perpaduan Rakyat Sabah, Parti Bumi Kenyalang and Parti Utama Rakyat each has a candidate for parliamentary seats.

This election also features 108 Independent candidates, another record in the country’s general election history.

In the GE13 and GE14, 79 and 24 Independent candidates contested parliamentary seats respectively.

Selangor has 22 parliamentary constituencies, which recorded the highest number of parliamentary seat candidates at 124, followed by Sabah (119), Perak (100), Johor (96), Sarawak (92), Kedah (68), Kelantan (63), Penang (58), Pahang (55), Kuala Lumpur (52), Negri Sembilan (35), Terengganu (33), Malacca (25) and Perlis (13) while Putrajaya and Labuan have six candidates each.

For state seats, Perak leads the list of most candidates at 220, followed by Pahang (150), Perlis (64) and seven candidates for the Bugaya state by-election in Sabah.

Barisan Nasional (BN) has fielded 117 candidates for state seats, PN and PH (116 each), Pejuang (45), Warisan (18) and 24 are Independent candidates.

In the GE14, the EC received 2,333 nomination papers during the one-hour nomination period, of which 687 were for 222 parliamentary seats and 1,646 for 505 state seats. – Bernama, November 5, 2022.