‘Not much difference between DAP and Umno’

Luke Rintod

United Borneo Front president Jeffrey Kitingan also warns Sabahans to beware of Barisan Nasional which is bent on moving towards extremism to perpetuate its hold on power.

KOTA KINABALU: Peninsular-based DAP is bullying local opposition Sabah Progressive party (SAPP) just like how they (including PKR) thumbed Sarawak Nasional Party (SNAP) in the runup to the polls on April 16, said United Borneo Front president Jeffrey Kitingan.

According to Jeffrey, DAP advisor Lim Kit Siang had started on a wrong footing in Sabah with his arrogant attitude and by pitting local (opposition) parties against each other.

“Judging from this new development among the opposition parties, we can see clearly that there is not much difference between DAP and Umno too.

“Definitely they are not thinking of the Borneo agenda.

“I expected DAP to be more understanding regarding our dreams as Sabahans, but obviously DAP is too much engrossed with trying to get the Sabahans’ votes to the point that it feels it can come to Sabah and push us around although we are all in the opposition,” said Jeffrey, a former PKR vice president.

Jeffrey had cited PKR’s arrogant rule of Sabah as the reason for quitting PKR early this year.

He called on Sabahans to reject DAP’s attitude and reminded them that only local parties can best serve their interests.

“Let’s do away with relying on Peninsular parties to defend our rights. The people of Sabah and Sarawak have been tolerating this problem for 47 years now and have been hoping that the federal leaders would change their attitude but they never seem to change.

“We can see that the Peninsula leaders and parties are in Sabah to serve their own peninsula agendas … pushing their own political games at the expense of Sabahans.

“And, the worst thing is that the Pakatan Rakyat component parties are obviously trying to outdo each other in Sabah and Sarawak.

“Recently DAP and PKR bullied SNAP in Sarawak and now they are bullying SAPP in Sabah,” he said in a statement.

Third Force needed

He said the best thing for Sabahans and Sarawakians to do now under such circumstances is to take charge of their own future rather than rely on peninsula-based parties.

“We need to form the Third Force, the coalition of local parties outside the BN and the Pakatan.

“This is the best approach because this will enable us to pursue our own agenda.

“We must also beware of the current trend in which BN is bent on moving towards extremism to perpetuate its hold on power, at all cost.

“Even the Pakatan is using extreme measures to fight the BN, and both are not too concerned about what all this will do to the country,” he said.

Jeffrey called on the leaders in Sabah and Sarawak to be very careful with what they do and who they link up with in their bid to oust the Barisan Nasional (BN) government.

“They may make the grave mistake of destroying the country instead of steering it to progress and prosperity.

“We need to formulate better policies and draw up more effective programmes.

“Our most important objective here is to save Sabah because we can clearly see that Sabah is going fast down the drain.”