KUALA LUMPUR, March 3: The following are key facts about Malaysia's general elections, which are expected later this month after Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi announced the dissolution of parliament on Wednesday.

- About 10.3 million people, aged 21 and above, are eligible to vote in the country's 11th general elections since independence from Britain in 1957. This includes some one million people voting for the first time.

- They will choose 219 representatives for the lower house of parliament and 505 lawmakers for 12 state assemblies for a new five-year term. This is an increase of 26 parliamentary and 63 state seats after a recent reworking of electoral boundaries.

- Candidates can only begin their campaigns after nomination day, which will be set by the Election Commission. There must be a minimum one-week campaigning period before polling which must be held within 60 days of parliament being dissolved, but is expected before the end of March.

- Individual candidates are elected on the first-past-the-post system and the party with the most seats wins. - Some 7,500 polling stations, involving 170,000 workers, will open for a single day of voting from 8.00 am to 5.00 pm. The results are expected to be declared within hours of the polls closing.

- Racial breakdown of the voters: Malays 52 percent, Chinese 35 percent, Indians 10 percent, plus indigenous peoples, according to the Electoral Commission. -AFP