At 8.40pm he had polled more than 63,000 votes for a majority of more than 36,000 votes over his Barisan Nasional rival, Raja Affandi Raja Noor, a retired general and former defence forces chief.

Umno secretary-general Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki, in an 8pm posting on Facebook, congratulated PAS for their “great victory” in the by-election. He noted that the result did not affect the position of the unity federal government coalition.

“This means that Perikatan Nasional remains in opposition with 69 seats while the unity government retains the support of 152 MPs,” he said.

Samsuri, who is also Terengganu menteri besar, was in a straight fight with Raja Affandi in the by-election, which was called after the election court annulled the victory of PAS candidate Che Alias Hamid in the general election in November last year.

The election court held that the distribution of government aid to voters during the campaign period constituted election bribery.

Che Alias won a second term in the seat with a 27,179-vote majority over his closest rival, Terengganu Umno chief and former menteri besar Ahmad Said. The other two candidates were Hasuni Sudin of Pakatan Harapan and Rosli Ab Ghani of Pejuang.

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