The Barisan Nasional candidate for the Bandar state seat in Kuala Terengganu is quietly confident of wrestling it away from PAS, the party which has been ruling the state since 1999.

Toh Chin Yaw, from MCA, holds the distinction of being the sole non-Muslim candidate to contest in Terengganu and being a local born, he claims to have sufficient influence to sway the votes in his favour.

Forty eight-year-old Toh is in a stand off with incumbent Md Azmi Lop Yusof, who in the last polls obtained 6,756 votes, or a majority of 511, to defeat BN/MCA's Wong Foon Meng who bagged 6,245 votes.

The Bandar state seat, located within the PAS-held Kuala Terengganu parliamentary constituency, has a total of 18,757 voters, of which 61 percent are Malays, followed by 38 percent Chinese. The electorate is largely made up of civil servants and people involved in business and trade.

In 1999, PAS swept up 28 of the 32 state seats, with Umno taking the rest. PAS also seized seven of eight parliament seats. Keadilan won the other.

Reneged pledges

Speaking to malaysiakini , Toh said that his chances are good as PAS had failed to fulfill several promises made to the local Chinese community.

"They promised to allocate land to build new Chinese primary schools. That did not take place. They also did not deliver the promised RM500,000 donation for Chinese primary schools here," said Toh, who is also the Kuala Terengganu MCA Youth chief.

He added that the state authority had also not kept their pre-election promises to open a pig farm in the state.

"What we see, however, is the introduction of strict Islamic laws which ignored the rights of non-Muslims. Their policies are also not good for the business," he said.

He said that PAS has come to realise that it is losing ground among Chinese voters and to counter this, the party has resorted to putting up banners in Mandarin around Kuala Terengganu.

He assured the Chinese in his constituency that they will enjoy more benefits if BN is returned to power.

'Will do more'

However, this view is not shared by Toh's opponent Md Azmi, who insists that the Chinese community in Bandar back him fully.

He said that contrary to Toh's claims, PAS had kept its promises to the Chinese community in the state.

"In the past five years, the state government has given land to expand Sekolah Menengah Chung Hwa Wei Sin and a kindergarten in Dungun.

"I cannot promise a lot of things because I'm not god. I just have two hands and two legs and my funds are limited."

However I will give land to Chinese school if available," he told malaysiakini .

"We have also changed the name of Jalan Bandar to Jalan Kampung Cina to recognise the community in the state," he added.

Md Azmi, who won the Bandar seat in 1999 after dumping Umno for PAS, also said that the Chinese community should not be unduly worried over Islamic laws in the state.

"These laws are only enforced on Muslims. Non-Muslims still can practice their traditional culture and this includes stage performances by actors of both sexes."

He also said that new projects in the pipeline include the building of more houses in Bandar, open to the Chinese.

He said that claims that PAS had failed to develop Terengganu were baseless, adding that it was impossible for the party to development the state after 40 years of neglect under the BN.