Incumbent Balik Pulau MP Mohd Yusmadi Mohd Yusoff has said that he will not contest in any seat in the upcoming general election.

NONE “Balik Pulau will have a new PKR candidate for the 13th general election. Wait for (PKR de facto leader) Anwar Ibrahim’s announcement in Penang tonight,” he tweeted this morning.

To a question, he confirmed that he won’t be contesting in any seat.

“Many have asked why I am not contesting. Thus far, the only excuse that I can muster is, ‘I wanted to get a driving license, but failed’,” he said cryptically.

There has been speculation that the newcomer Muhammad Bakhtiar Wan Chik would contest in Balik Pulau instead.

NONE State PKR chief Mansor Othman ( right ) had supposedly made the announcement previously - an allegation that he denies.

This is despite the local PKR division proposing Yusmadi and state legislative assembly speaker Abdul Halim Hussein as possible candidates.

The Balik Pulau constituency covers the western half of the Penang island, and is often described as the last bastion of the Malay heartland on the isle of Penang.

    

Umno has held the constituency since 1969 until the last general election, where Yusmadi scraped through with a 708-vote majority despite being a ‘local boy’ going against the not-so-popular Dr Norraesah Mohamad.

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