After breakthrough at Sarawak polls, PSB positions itself as govt-in-waiting

 

Parti Sarawak Bersatu (PSB) said its performance in the Sarawak legislative assembly elections has proven that it is a "force to be reckoned with".

In its first public statement since the Dec 18 polls, PSB said it was humbling for the fledgling party to place second in the election, garnering 18.69 percent of the votes cast.

"That translated to 139,515 votes with four seats won against Gabungan Parti Sarawak’s (GPS) 60 percent, or 457,253 votes in return for 76 seats – meaning, GPS won 93 percent of the 82 seats contested based on just 60 percent of the votes cast," said the party.

Now that the party has been voted into office, PSB said that it will function as a watchdog and alternative "government-in-waiting".

PSB made its electoral debut during the Dec 18 election. It was widely regarded as a splinter party of the Sarawak United Peoples' Party (Supp), a GPS coalition member. 

Despite being relatively new, PSB candidates generally performed better than candidates from the more established Pakatan Harapan.

Probe election violation 

Meanwhile, PSB urged the authorities to look into alleged misuse of government machinery and resources by GPS candidates.

"Clear infringements of election practices included... the blatant use of the resident and district offices, state secretary's office, government mouthpieces such as the Sarawak Public Communications Unit (Ukas), government vehicles and all the state-owned helicopters being deployed for campaigning for the benefit of GPS candidates

"Community leaders and headmen were repeatedly put under pressure of being removed from their positions if they did not support GPS. Obviously, these had consequences especially in the rural areas and a spanner was thrown into the works for a fair and clean election," PSB added. - Mkini