KOTA KINABALU:The public revelation by some Warisan and PH members of the Sabah Legislative Assembly that they have signed Statutory Declarations to support Datuk Shafie Apdal as the Chief Minister show that the Chief Minister no longer trusts his assembly members.
It is unprecedented that a sitting Chief Minister who claims to have a two-thirds majority in the Assembly has to make his own Assembly members sign Statutory Declarations to support himself as Chief Minister. The only plausible reason is that the Chief Minister believes that he has lost the support of his own Assembly members. Therefore, the existence of these SDs by government assembly members exposes the fact of major underlying problems in the Warisan-led alliance. The SDs also prove that the previous shows of strength for Shafie at a few press conferences by many Assembly members are of no effect at all.
The instability of the Warisan-led alliance has been aggravated by the tussle to be the Prime Ministerial candidate. At the national level, PH parties DAP and PKR support the national opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, as the Prime Ministerial candidate. But in Sabah, the same parties support the Parti Warisan President, Shafie Apdal as the Prime Minister. It will not be long before this tension within PH and Warisan come to a final clash leading to the breakup of the Warisan-led alliance in Sabah.
*Warisan is the ground zero of defectors*
Parti Warisan is in no position to complain about the prospects of their Assembly members leave the party. This is because Parti Warisan is the “ground zero” of defections. All defectors from BN have joined Parti Warisan. Indeed, the Warisan-led Sabah government is made possible only because of the defection of YBs from BN. As Warisan has failed miserably to govern and its party president is obsessed with becoming the Prime Minister, it is no surprise that many of the Assembly members wish to re-consider their political stand in the light of the self-destruction of the PH federal government.
*Will Shafie deny he was on a shopping trip for MPs in KL? *
To put things in perspective, I call on the MP for Semporna/assemblyman for Senallang/President of Parti Warisan/Chief Minister of Sabah to deny that:-
(1) Before the May 18 and July 13 sittings of parliament, he has personally tried to lure a number of MPs from Sarawak and other parties to rebel against the Prime Minister,
(2) Sabah government Sabah House and other assets in Kuala Lumpur were abused for the purpose of attempting to topple the Prime Minister,
(3) After the last general elections in which Parti Warisan won only 21 out of 60 seats, Parti Warisan and its representatives had offered of posts to BN and STAR Assembly members to defect to Warisan, and
(4) (4) Defecting assembly persons were given ministerial positions.-
Datuk Yong Teck Lee
SAPP President
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