Voters in Sabah began casting their ballots on Saturday, in a state election seen as a referendum on Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s leadership midway into his first term.
Anwar, who came to office in 2022 after pulling together a rag-tag coalition of former political rivals, depends on Sabah to prop up his parliamentary supermajority. His coalition has so far fended off the challenge of a Malay-nationalist opposition bloc and pushed through unpopular measures, including subsidy cuts to pare down government debt.
But in Sabah – where 596 candidates are contesting 73 seats – the prime minister faces a young electorate tired of failed promises by the central government over the decades to provide a reliable water and electricity supply, while taking the profits of the state’s natural resources to develop the peninsula.
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Among the nearly 1.8 million voters – over half of whom are aged between 18 and 39 – many are angry with members of the dominant political dynasties in Sabah, who critics accuse of being mired in corruption scandals and have benefited the most from the exploitation of the state’s resources, including oil and gas, forests and marine life.
“The main issue is accountability, not more promises,” said Sudirman Arshad, 22, a student activist from the town of Lahad Datu in Sabah’s impoverished east coast district.
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While it will not affect the makeup of the federal parliament, analysts see the state election as a key indicator of Anwar’s popularity outside his strongholds in the peninsula as he plots a path towards the general election due by early 2028.