The Pro-Mahasiswa camps of Universiti Malaya (UM) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) sprang surprises today and won their campus elections.

The anti-establishment camp swept all nine campus seats and 14 faculty seats in the nation's oldest university, while their opponent, Pro-Aspirasi only won 16 faculty seats.

Independents took the remaining two faculty seats.

At UKM, the Pro-Mahasiswa from won 22 seats, while the pro-Aspirasi obtained 15 seats.

Meanwhile in Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), the Pro-Mahasiswa camp repeated last year's defeat. According to unofficial results, they only managed to capture 12 seats while their opponent grabbed 31 seats.

Results for other campus elections are still being tallied as of press time.

The results come after three days of fierce campaigning, intense rivalry between the two main camps and even some drama, elections were held at five public universities today for the control of their student bodies.

Institutions involv NONE ed are UM, UKM,  UPM, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) and Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM).

Voting began at 9am and the polling centres are due to close at 5pm. The earliest results are expected at UM and UPM, which are using the electronic voting system.

At UKM , Pro-Mahasiswa spokesperson Faiz Ismail said his team had sent a letter to the election administrator, objecting to the candidacy of a pro-Aspirasi nominee.

 

He claimed that Mohammad Norelfarra was not qualified to contest because he had failed to attend a mandatory workshop organised by the campus authorities.

NONE "Apparently, he has a letter from the vice-chancellor (accepting) his absence at the workshop, but we have yet to see it. We feel that, if a person did not attend the workshop, they can’t contest, no matter what their excuse.”

At UM, the voting process moved slowly because many students were at lectures. An election worker said the numbers were expected to pick up during the lunch break.

 

At UPM, as many as 21,643 students are expected to vote. As at 2.50pm, about half of them had cast their ballots.

This morning, red paint was found splashed on a motorcycle belonging to former Pro-Aspirasi veep Zulkhairy Mohd Zulkiflee and on a car belonging to student adviser Fauzi Karim.

Zulkhairy said he suspects that the same people are behind the incidents, which occurred at the 10th Residential College. He has lodged a police report at the Dato Abu Bakar Baginda police station near Sepang.

Additional reporting by Abdul Rahim Sabri