Malacca polls: Police identify 16 'hotspots'

Police will be paying special attention to 16 constituencies which are expected to be fiercely contested with multi-cornered fights in the Malacca election on Nov 20.

State police chief Abdul Majid Mohd Ali said his officers and men were ready to discharge their duty to maintain public order and security to ensure a smooth election for voters to exercise their democratic rights.

“We will closely monitor all constituencies but the main focus is on these 16 'hotspots' where we expect to see multi-cornered fights.

“Besides that, Malacca police will also deploy four drones from the Drone Unit to monitor the situation in these hotspots,” he told reporters after attending a Public Order Exercise (POX) at the Melaka Tengah police station today.

Also present were Malacca deputy police chief Razali Abu Samah and Melaka Tengah district police chief Afzanizar Ahmad.

Abdul Majid said 3,835 police personnel, including 1,245 from other state contingents and Bukit Aman’s Internal Security and Public Order Department, would be deployed throughout the state election period.

He added that 17 Strike Force squads had been formed at the Malacca police contingent headquarters for the polls, while reinforcements would be sent by the Federal Reserve Unit (FRU) and Public Order Riot Unit (Poru) of Bukit Aman.

"What we saw this morning was POX, an exercise which showed that we are prepared to face any eventuality like the declaration of an emergency to guarantee public safety,” he said.

- Bernama