“I do not accept it because we never played up racial issues.

“What we were doing was defending the rights of the Malays and non-Malays, that’s all.

“There were Chinese and Indians supporting us. There is no way they would have supported us if we had used the race card,” he told reporters after visiting veteran actor Ebby Yus at his house at Kampung Baru in Kuala Lumpur.

He said that Umno “never stood on a racial platform” to win an election.

Yesterday, Pakatan Harapan candidate M Manogaran blamed his defeat at the hands of BN’s Ramli Mohd Noor on the coalition’s “racial campaign”.

He said PH did better than BN in issues concerning the Orang Asli, but “the sad part of this by-election is that BN used the race factor”.

Last night, Barisan Nasional candidate Ramli Mohd Nor won the by-election by obtaining 12,038 votes, defeating Manogaran (8,800 votes) and independent candidates Sallehudin Ab Talib (314) and Wong Seng Yee (276).

In a separate statement, Umno vice-president Mohamed Khaled Nordin said the party and PAS championed the interests of the Malays and bumiputeras without denying the rights of the other races.

He said the Malays and the bumiputeras could not be deceived by a party like DAP.

Khaled also said a major factor for BN’s victory was its concern for the welfare of the Orang Asli.

He said issues concerning the Orang Asli could not be taken lightly and they could not be won over by “seasonal gifts”.

After 60 years of BN administration in Pahang, the Orang Asli could not be swayed by a PH government whose nine-month rule had seen several breaches of its election promises, he added.