Barisan Nasional will not contest all 73 state seats in Sabah at the coming state election, says BN chairman Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
However, BN would contest more seats than the 14 it won in the 2020 state election. Six of the 14 were later lost to defections.
“I will announce the number of seats once we finalise it. The additional seats will be new ones. However, we are confident that most of them will side with BN,” Sinar Harian reported him as saying at the state Umno headquarters in Kota Kinabalu today.
He said Umno and BN have identified the number of seats they believe to be suitable, based on their winnability.
BN would also work with a “third force” in Sabah to ensure that voters in the contested seats lean towards BN candidates. He did not elaborate on which parties would be in the “third force”.
When asked about seat negotiations with Pakatan Harapan, Zahid said the final decision on seats will be made once the state assembly is dissolved to avoid clashes.
Unless dissolved earlier, the Sabah assembly’s term expires on Nov 11, after which an election must be held within 60 days.
