The opposition said it faces significant challenge contesting for seats with large numbers of postal voters in the coming Sarawak election, owing to the voting history of army and police personnel that mostly go the way of the BN ruling government.

"It is a very difficult battle. Ultra difficult," DAP's state leader Chong Chieng Jen told reporters in Stakan last night.

A total of 25,000 out of 1.1 million registered voters in Sarawak will be allowed to participate in early voting on May 3.

In Stakan alone, there are 7,058 postal voters, constituting 47.5 percent of all registered voters in the constituency, according to statistics released by the Election Commission (EC) last Thursday.

Kota Sentosa, where Chong is the incumbent, has 3,170 postal voters.

"The army, they are very disciplined. They listen to their commanders when it comes to battle. But when it comes to voting, they are citizens of Malaysia.

"We hope to bring awareness to them that elections are a democratic process, that they have the right to choose which government they want," Chong said.

Allegations of fraud and intimidation of uniformed personnel are a trend in Malaysian elections, peaking in the 2013 general election, according to the Human Rights Watch.

BN won 133 seats in Parliament in the 222-seat Dewan Rakyat, compared to Pakatan's 89 seats, but had only 47.38% of the popular vote.

The Merdeka Center, a national elections watch group, said in a 2013 report that without advance and postal votes, BN would have lost up to 22 parliamentary seats in that election.

Meanwhile, DAP is expected to field a Malay candidate for the Stakan seat. This will be DAP special assistant Abdul Aziz Isa, 26 ( photo, above ), who is a great grandson of former Sarawak governor Abdul Rahman Yakub.

Abdul Aziz is also the grand-nephew of current Governor Abdul Taib Mahmud.

If announced as the party's candidate, Abdul Aziz, who was present with Chong at the party's launch of a service centre in the Stakan constituency last night, will face Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu's (PBB) Mohamad Ali, 65, formerly the state asemblyman for Muara Tuang.

Both Abdul Aziz and Mohamad Ali are not native to Stakan, which was formed after a delineation exercise in 2014 and has a mix of Malay and Iban voters.