SEMENYIH POLLS | Umno vice-president Ismail Sabri said that though Cameron Highlands and Semenyih have different voter demographics, the "spirit of Cameron Highlands" will carry over to the Semenyih by-election.

"The spirit of Cameron Highlands has already surfaced in Semenyih.

"Our victory in Cameron Highlands, I believe, has given new spirit to Umno members and machinery, as well as higher confidence to our machinery due to our big win in Cameron Highlands," Ismail said in a video uploaded onto a YouTube account called 'Sahabat Gunung' today.

The Cameron Highlands by-election on Jan 26 saw BN retain the seat with a 3,238-vote majority, a significant increase from its majority in the 14th general election (GE14), which was 597 votes.

However, Ismail noted, the voter demographics between Cameron Highlands and Semenyih were very different, as the Pahang parliamentary constituency consisted mainly of rural voters, whereas the Semenyih state seat had a mix of rural voters, city outskirt voters and urban voters.

"As this is a change from the categories of voters in Cameron Highlands, the approach and so on will definitely be different from Cameron Highlands," he said.

The Semenyih by-election is set for March 2, with this Saturday being the nomination day.

Ismail said the victory in Cameron Highlands had a great effect on Umno's cooperation with PAS, though he did not elaborate what the effects were.

He also said the Cameron Highlands victory showed that Umno has not only retained the support of the Malay voters, but has increased their support, as well as that of the rural voters.