Kitingan brothers bust-up for real or to deflect attention from illegal migrant RCI?

Huguan Siou (Paramount Chief) of Sabah, Joseph Pairin Kitingan, appears to have once again bitten off more than what he can chew.

Indeed, it will be a wonder, if not a miracle, if he isn't forced this time to apologise soon profusely and vacate his government and party posts as well. He may have cooked his goose, hide and all, and with good reasons.

Rumors of Jeffrey contesting in Keningau

In a "coup de grace" of sorts against himself, Pairin suggested on Mon 27 Feb to the local media that there was really no need for an Opposition in Sabah. He stopped short of saying "no need for an Opposition in Malaysia" and that would have been an even bigger hornet's nest to out-run for dear life.

He had apparently taken offense at speculative reports in cyberspace suggesting that Jeffrey Kitingan, his younger brother, may be eyeing his Keningau parliamentary seat. The local media lost no time in gleefully jumping on the bandwagon especially since Keningau is the capital of the Dusun heartland.

Pairin, with bitter memories of being stabbed repeatedly in the back between 1985 and 1995 -- Harris Salleh, Mustapha Harun, Mark Koding, Yong Teck Lee, Clarence Bongkos Malakun, Joseph Kurup, Rubin Balang and Lajim Ukin -- went into apparent overdrive in his paranoia. He stressed that Jeffrey was being kurang ajar (ill-mannered) towards him "for entertaining the notion" of mounting a challenge against him.

Pairin also said he expected his brother to at least "respect him" -- meaning, keep away from Keningau -- since "blood was thicker than water". Some PBS insider reports suggest that Pairin may want a son to replace him in Keningau, if not during the 13th General Election, then certainly during the 14th GE. Jeffrey's plans, if any in Keningau, would therefore upset Pairin's calculations.

The younger Kitingan was characteristically double-quick to deny that he was eyeing the Keningau seat, and if he was, "so what?" The "so what" bit, so unlike Jeffrey, is likely to rile Pairin even further. He's reportedly thoroughly disoriented now. Jeffrey has for so long been Pairin's loyal and faithful errand boy in Sabah politics that this latest possibility has come as a huge shock for the older man.

Brotherly love or not, there is now the State Reform Party

Jeffrey now has his own party, the State Reform Party (Star), which he heads as Chairman. Pairin, who had earlier invited Jeffrey back to his Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) which the brothers co-founded in 1985, was disappointed but kept a discreet silence. Now, given Pairin's uncontrollable public outburst over Keningau, it appears that he had in fact been steaming all the time over the Star move.

Pairin jumped with joy when Jeffrey, upon his advice, quit as Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) vice president in early January last year, the second time he has done so. But Pairin's happiness was short-lived when Star entered the fray in Sabah with his brother not only leading it but eyeing, according to the young Turks in the party, all 60 state seats and 26 parliamentary seats including Labuan.

Those who know Pairin say anything is possible when he gets mad! This is a guy who once told de facto Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad to take a hike when the latter tried to poke his nose too much into Sabah affairs. Everyone in Sabah paid a high price, as a result, since Mahathir did everything possible to make the state suffer. The reverberations are still being felt today. Sabah is the poorest state in Malaysia, according to the World Bank.

Sabah is not Pairin's personal ancestral home

However, no matter how mad Pairin has become he cannot escape the people's wrath for his current take on the Opposition. For starters, the Huguan Siou has placed himself in the difficult position of explaining why he led the Opposition in Sabah for many years before caving in to the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) not once but twice.

In between, Pairin pulled out his party from BN on the eve of the 1990 General Election. He had expected a political tsunami but fell flat-footed when the Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia failed to deliver. This was not the first time that Pairin had bitten off more than he could chew. The political tsunami that Pairin expected in Peninsular Malaysia did not take place until 2008.

Now that Pairin has decided on his own that Sabah does not need an Opposition, what's his next move?  Is he going to suggest to the Elections Commission to scrap plans to hold the 13th General Election soon in Sabah as elsewhere in Malaysia?

The sovereignty of a nation lies with the people. Once a people have lost their sovereignty, as with Iraq under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, the international community is duty-bound under international law to act through the United Nations and restore that sovereignty.

The bottomline is that Sabah is not a one-party state, a communist state, or an absolute monarchy or Pairin's ancestral property. Being Huguan Siou does not give him a licence to act like an absolute monarch.

Brotherly show to deflect attention from illegal migrant RCI?

Even as it is, with a fledging opposition in the state, the BN by its very format has circumscribed the democratic process by endorsing elite power-sharing through seat-sharing and a pre-election coalition pact. This denies the grassroots meaningful participation in the democratic process and experiment.

Still, the BN has been unable to decimate the Opposition. The Opposition too has been forced to emulate the BN's seat-sharing and coalition formats while swearing by an Agenda for Change and Reform. Hopefully, Pairin's tantrums are not part of the politics of distraction and disruption rolled out by the BN from time to time to pull the wool over the people's eyes.

The people are more interested in why the Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) on Illegal Immigrants in Sabah is yet to be announced. The spat between the Kitingan brothers, whether sibling rivalry or a wayang kulit of a sandiwara, is not the be all and end all of life and, if important, can wait.

Malaysia Chronicle