The deadline for withrawing from contesting in the April 16 Sarawak state election passed at midnight yesterday with none of the 213 candidates in the fray, including 41 independents, pulling out.

azlan Sarawak Election Commission director Takun Sunggah said told reporters in Kuching today that immediately after the deadline passed, the EC issued instructions to the Sarawak branch of Percetakan Nasional Malaysia Berhad (PNMB) to print ballot papers accordingly.

PNMB managing director Izham Yusoff said PNMB commenced printing ballot papers for 18,363 postal voters at 12.01am, on receiving confirmation of the candidates contesting.

"We already had the candidates list but needed to wait for confirmation from the EC first. We managed to complete printing the ballot papers for postal voters at 7am using about 40 workers," he said, adding that the rest of the ballot papers would be printed well before polling day.

Takun said he hoped PNMB could complete printing all ballot papers at the latest by April 14 as geographical factors in Sarawak required additional time for ballot papers to be sent to polling centres, especially in remote areas.

- Bernama