Pakatan’s seat tussle a boon for Sabah BN

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 12 — Barisan Nasional (BN) will profit from the current seat scramble between Pakatan Rakyat (PR) and Sabah’s opposition parties to win the next polls, state BN leaders have said.

Sabah BN leaders told The Malaysian Insiderthat they hope to fully use the advantage from altercations between federal PR leadership and parties such as Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP), Sabah Reform Front (APS) and Pertubuhan Pakatan Perubahan Sabah (PPPS).

“We do have an advantage ... but (BN) will take a look-and-see approach,” Sabah BN secretary Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan (picture) said here.

Silam MP Salleh Kalbi agreed with Abdul Rahman, and explained that the scramble is similar to what happened with Sabah United Party (PBS) in the past

“Obviously, the alliance did not last long,” he added.

PBS information chief, Datuk Johnny Mositun, stressed that the discussions between PR and the component parties were clearly lopsided, considering SAPP was only given a small number of seats.

“The discussions have been going on for so long without a conclusion ... I think SAPP’s leadership can see for themselves, they might end up with the same fate as PBS before,” he said.

Mositun explained that PBS has also organised a number of seat talks with PKR president Datuk Seri Wan Azizah, but its demands have largely been ignored.

Abdul Rahman pointed out that it has been common for PKR to demand the lion’s share of seats, despite failing to win any.

“We see this happening in Sarawak elections too, where they contested 49 out of 71 seats, but they could win only three,” said the Kota Belud MP.

He also predicted that PR will lose most of its contested seats, in particular around 33 to 34 seats in Muslim Bumiputera-majority areas.

Mositun was convinced that the seat allocation issue will shift Sabahans’ support to BN, since it has been proven that BN component parties can sit together and work their differences out.

“With these problems, (PR) is not showing a good example that they can govern the country, whatever that they have been doing was strictly political for the general elections,” he declared.

Last week, The Malaysian Insider reported that PR’s seat talks with the SAPP have come to a temporary halt in yet another indicator that it may be a fractured opposition front that will face BN in Election 2013.

The Malaysian Insider also understands that PR is unwilling to cede seats to the Sabah-based SAPP despite its claim to have greater appeal with locals in the east Malaysian state, insisting that theirs is a more Chinese-dominated party.

Meanwhile, SAPP, APS and PPPS are now locked in a verbal warfare with SAPP chief Datuk Yong Teck Lee on one side, and ex-BN strongmen Datuk Seri Wilfred Mojilip Bumburing and Datuk Seri Lajim Ukin on the other. 

The discussions have been going on for so long without a conclusion ... I think SAPP’s leadership can see for themselves, they might end up with the same fate as PBS before. — Johnny Mositun

Both factions have gone public with their bitter exchanges and name calling, each accusing the other of political greed and an unwillingness to unite against BN.

The opposition front in Sabah is a crowded one and in the months leading up to the coming 13th general election, all players have been scrambling for their share of the state’s 60 state seats up for grabs.

PR, the opposition pact that was formed in the peninsula after BN suffered significant losses in Election 2008, has set its sights on toppling the ruling pact from its Sabah bastion.

But Sabah residents are said to have grown more communal over the years, with opposition politicians in the Land below the Wind often blaring the “Sabah for Sabahans” war cry, fuelling the already deep-rooted anti-Malaya sentiment felt by locals there.

In Election 2008, BN lost its customary two-thirds parliamentary majority largely due to significant losses in the peninsula, where it won just 85 seats while the opposition swept 80 seats.

BN’s saving grace was in Sabah, Sarawak and Labuan where the coalition trounced the opposition and made a near-clean sweep, winning 55 parliamentary seats to the opposition’s two.