Support for Jeffrey's calls to leave Sabah parties alone

RANAU : State Reform Party's (Star) Sabah chairman, Datuk Dr Jeffrey Kitingan has again repeated and reiterated his call for Malaya-based political parties especially the Pakatan Rakyat to consider focusing its aim at wresting all the 165 Parliamentary seats at stake in the 11-state Peninsular and to leave Sabah and Sarawak parties to stand in the rest 57 in both states and one in Labuan.

"We don't want to consider PR as our enemy but we plead to its leaders to consider the fact that they are already having the biggest share, 165 Parliamentary seats in Peninsular, why should they still come here and get our Sabah and Sarawak seats?

"Let Sabah and Sarawak political parties contest in the two states, and we will support you (PR or Barisan Nasional?) to get Putrajaya..." he said in his speech launching the Paginatan Star in Kampung Tagudon Baru near here yesterday.

While many in PR and BN surely are not very supportive of Dr Kitingan's argument, the more than 400 community leaders and opinion leaders who turned up at the function yesterday seemed to be all in agreement with him throughout his exactly one-hour long speech.

Kitingan singled out Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) in his plea when he said "if PKR wants to take Sabah and Sarawak seats, it would expose itself to the danger of being labelled as another Umno or even worse than Umno because it wants to take more seats than what Umno already has in Sabah".

Earlier, Star's Ranau division chief, Jalibin Paidi, in his speech also made similar remark when he said he personally support PR to take BN in the whole of Peninsular but not in Sabah.

"I think the people of Sabah also supported this idea, but why must they (PR) still want to wrest our seats in Sabah and Sarawak. It is not that we are against them but we do not want to be just another stepping stone for PR to wrest power in Putrajaya, and then forgotten.

"We are not satisfied being treated as mere 'assistant' for them to get into Putrajaya (seat of Federal government), we want to be the decider who should be the rightful government," he said adding that Star wants to raise the voice of left-behind Sabah and Sarawak to be heard and respected by an incoming Federal government.

Jalibin, a teacher who had just resigned from his post, is believed poised to be Star candidate, either in Keranaan state constituency or Ranau parliamentary seat.

Also giving speech yesterday was another teacher who had also just resigned, Feddrin Tuliang, who is slated to stand as Star candidate in the Paginatan state constituency.

Meanwhile, a local young "towkay" Kong Soon Choi, who hosted the function at the compound of his Sabindo businesses in Tagudon Baru, in his inspiring welcoming speech said he offered to help "not for himself but when he thought about the future of his own kids being treated as 'immigrants' in their own country, if he does not act and help now...'

Also in attendance were Sabah Star secretary, Guandee Kohoi, and Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) vice president Japiril Suhaimin.