SAPP: We'll scrap unwanted mega projects

Maverick independent party Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) has vowed to scrap three controversial federal projects "when we come to power" in Sabah come the next general election.

SAPP will fulfil this promise as the state government has the power to stop projects, declared party president Yong Teck Lee in one of the strongest indications of SAPP's plan to take over the state administration.

But until then, he said, SAPP would not let up pressure on the federal government, warning that the party would organise mass protests if the people's opposition to the projects were not heeded.

Yong (below) said the three projects - the coal-fired power plant in Sinakut, Lahad Datu, and two proposed dams at Kaiduan in Papar and Kg Tambatuon in Kota Belud - were "unnecessary, with inflated costs and do not benefit the people".

Opening a new branch of the party at Kg Nambazan in Moyog, Penampang, recently, he said, "SAPP's Youth wing has initiated a solidarity gathering on these three issues and if the government proceeds with the projects, there will be protests in the state."

The three projects together are estimated to cost well over RM2 billion.

The 300-megawatt coal-fired power plant, proposed to address power shortfall in Sabah's east coast, is in its third incarnation after strong objections from both Sabahans and the state government scuttled two earlier attempts to build the facility in different locations.

The two dams have been proposed as water catchment areas to provide irrigation to support the expansion of agricultural activities.

The dams have been facing continued protests from the local communities as they would cause the displacement of thousands of people from their ancestral lands.

BN's successful divide-and-rule tactic

Yong, who pulled his party out of the BN in 2008 to be the only independent party in Parliament, said the onus was now on each and every Sabahan to unite against oppression and exploitation by the BN-led federal government.

Singling out Umno, he said the ruling coalition has succeeded in exploiting Sabah through its divide and rule tactic that had been "successfully applied" from the time of Mustapha Harun and Usno in the 1960s to the Harris Salleh and Berjaya-led state government of the 1970s and the Joseph Pairin Kitingan-PBS era from the mid-1980s to mid-1990s.

The former Sabah chief minister claimed that BN was desperate to keep its hold on Sabah and Sarawak, having realised that the two states were the only reason it remained in power after losing its two-thirds majority in Parliament in the watershed March 8, 2008, general election.

"We are easily divided. Therefore we are easily ruled and this is still happening in Sabah today," Yong noted.