Penang PKR deputy chief Bakthiar Wan Chik blamed this “repeat” loss to certain “dominant” sentiments among youths there, saying Perikatan Nasional had made use of these same sentiments during GE15.

He took solace, however, in the fact that PN’s wins in Seberang Jaya, Penanti and Permatang Pasir were slimmer majorities compared to the Permatang Pauh defeat in GE15.

“I feel (the results) are quite neck-to-neck… It shows that we have an opportunity to improve ourselves in the state constituencies under Permatang Pauh.

“The opposition has been playing with sentiments that we were unable to fend off on time, especially among youths,” he told reporters at a hotel here.

Permatang Pauh had been represented by Anwar, his wife Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, and their daughter Nurul Izzah, for a total of nine terms.

However, this streak broke in GE15, when PAS’ Fawwaz Jan defeated Nurul Izzah by 5,272 votes to wrest the seat from PKR.

Bakhtiar said the PKR machinery had put a lot of focus on Permatang Pauh since their loss in GE15, in an attempt to prevent PN wresting the state seats that fall under it.

He said a post-mortem of the results would provide a better understanding of what had taken place yesterday.

The PH-Barisan Nasional alliance won 29 seats in the 40-member state assembly while PN won 11 seats, largely in Seberang Perai.