Penang Umno needs to defend its 11 state assembly seats and achieve the '3-3-3-1 formula' if BN wants to regain Penang at the 13th general election.

Umno vice-president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said the formula involved Umno, MCA and Gerakan adding three seats each and MIC one seat to the existing 11 state assembly seats.

"We can form a BN government in Penang by a majority of one seat if we achieve this.

"But if the BN component parties work harder I'm confident we can win more state assembly seats here," he said.

Ahmad Zahid, who is also defence minister, was speaking to reporters after the launch of the 'BN, the Choice of the Youths' state-level programme in Butterworth yesterday.

'PKR being used by DAP'

In the 2008 general election, BN won only 11 of the 40 state assembly seats contested while DAP dominated with 19 seats, PKR nine and PAS one.

Commenting on the tiff between Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng and Deputy Chief Minister 1 Mansor Othman, Ahmad Zahid said the crisis was due to the PKR leader beginning to realise that his party was being used by DAP.

The crisis between Lim and Mansor was sparked by a leaked audio recording of the state PKR chairperson allegedly criticising Lim as cocky and arrogant during a closed-door party meeting in March.

- Bernama