Unfair of Rahim to put all blames on PBS

Although I am not a member of Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS), being a Kadazandusun leader with a sense of responsibility for my people, I must take Datuk Rahim Ismail to task for his arrogance against a former Sabah Government headed by Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan who was unfairly put under loads of pressures by UMNO during Dr Mahathir Mohamad tenure as Prime Minister.


It is no secret that Mahathir was hateful of the democratically-elected PBS Government from its day one in office in 1985. Rahim heaping praises to Mahathir can be taken as Rahim all this while condoning and supporting Mahathir's dirty tactics in victimising Pairin and PBS.

I am not a political supporter of Pairin but the people have to listen to the other sides of this sad story too, and not just from Rahim and PBS. This is even more so because UMNO leaders then accused the State Government as being a Christian Government that was anti-Islam and hence must be brought down at all costs. When PBS brought down the Berjaya rule, as Datuk Harris Salleh admits in Paul Raffaele’s book, Harris Salleh of Sabah, there was a well-planned effort to bring down PBS based on the accusation that PBS was anti-Muslim. “Harris knew that if there was one charge that he could lay against PBS’s door that might turn any sympathetic federal politician against the new Sabah government, it was the alleged victimization of Muslims…. It was definite that if Harris could prove that the PBS government was victimizing Muslims, half his battle to keep the federal government on the wrong side of PBS was won” (p. 429). Clearly there was an intense maneuvers to bring down the PBS government and it was only through patience and incredible forbearance that PBS managed to survive for so long.

Rahim is wrong to put all the blame on Pairin for the events in the aftermath of the 1985 and 1986 elections. A major whiplash that PBS had to tolerate was the withdrawal of funding from Kuala Lumpur which could have forced to use the alleged RM2.5 billion in reserve as Rahim pointed out. PBS was simply that – a Christian government – that had to be brought down at all costs, regardless of whether the democratic process was followed or not. Mahathir's government took every income derived from Sabah like taxes and 95% of oil revenue, but gave nothing to the State Government then. For this Rahim must be very proud of, I am convinced.

On the matter of debts, can Rahim tell the world which government does not borrow money to develop its country or state? Even the Malaysian Federal Government under UMNO has been borrowing money to the tune of hundreds of billions of ringgits by now. As of last December it was US72 billion (RM216 billion). And whose fault it is that Sabah is so poor. Is Sabah now so rich after Umno has been in power here for 17 years? No! Even the current State Government under UMNO, also borrowed money by the billions, despite the Federal Government allocating billions every year for developments. But where is the money or development? Did Rahim forget the UMNO-led state government sold bonds to the tune of half a billion ringgit? Rahim himself was critical of the non-transparent manner in which this bond was issued while debating in the State Assembly. Even chief minister Musa Aman rebuked him... Has memory failed Rahim? Or is Rahim now trying very hard to ingratiate himself with the state Umno leadership by pitting venom on PBS, its fellow component?

On the land being sold to companies, Rahim must undertand that we had to develop the land because there was going to be economic spin-offs and creation of jobs from commercial and industrial development of land. He should bear in mind that the Umno state government also alienated huge land areas to their proxies and sold to outsiders, and not to forget the FMU which have become a sad story for us Sabahans. At least during Pairin’s rule, the natives lands and the NCR were not disturbed. I invite Rahim to now look the NCR and how it is violated everywhere under this Umno state government. We even have cases where natives were chased out from NCR lands and their houses torched by the authorities, and that their rubber threes were poisoned.
  
Dear Datuk, tell us if Mahathir was good to Sabah when he condoned the operation of the infamous IC Palsu project for the mostly Muslim illegal immigrants from Mindanao and Sulawesi? The illegal immigrant has given Sabah the "mother of all problems". Just because this grand design was for the purpose of drowning out the Kadazandusun Murut I would assume Rahim is very much in favour of the project. But how far can Umno go with this evil scheme? Are they willing to see Sabah go to the dogs and be taken over by aliens through a reverse takeover? What makes Umno think that the aliens will always vote for Umno? Don’t forget that the new bumiputeras can register their own party to kick out Umno one day.

DANIELJOHN JAMBUN