PUTRAJAYA: The Teluk Intan parliamentary by-election will be held on May 31, the Election Commission (EC) announced yesterday.

Nominations would be on May 19 and early voting on May 27, said EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof.

The by-election follows the death of the MP, Seah Leong Peng of the DAP, on May 1. Seah, 48, had succumbed to cancer.

Abdul Aziz said the hall of Sekolah Menengah Seri Perak in Jalan Changkat Jong, Teluk Intan, would be used for nomination day as well as the tallying of votes.

Thirty-six polling centres will be set up, 35 of them with 120 polling streams for ordinary voting and one for early voting, he said.

“The by-election will incur a cost of about RM1.4 million, and 957 workers will be appointed,” he told a press conference.

In the 13th general election, held last year, Seah won the seat by beating Datuk Mah Siew Keong of the Barisan Nasional (BN) and independent candidate Moralingam Kannan with a 7,313-vote majority.

Abdul Aziz said the 2013 electoral rolls gazetted on April 30 this year and updated as of May 1 would be used for the by-election.

According to the rolls, Teluk Intan has 60,349 voters comprising 59,927 ordinary voters, 410 early voters and 12 absentee voters, he said.

“Going by racial breakdown, the constituency has 23,301 Malay voters, 25,310 Chinese voters, 11,468 Indian voters, and 270 others,” he said.

He said copies of the rolls would be sold to the public from May 17.

Voters who want to check their status can surf the website www.spr.gov.my or type SPR<space>SEMAK<space>IDENTITY CARD NO and send an SMS to 15888 from that date.

Abdul Aziz said going by the category of age, voters between the ages of 30 and 39 comprised the biggest number of voters, totalling 12,365.

“Forty-five voters are also more than 100 years old,” he said.

Abdul Aziz also said that for security purposes, the EC would set up two enforcement teams for the campaign.

“As is the norm, only the appointed official observers are allowed into the nomination centre, polling centres and vote counting and tallying centres,” he said.

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on May 9, 2014.