The Battle for Putrajaya Hots Up

By: Tan Sri Panglima Herman Luping 

WITH the UMNO's annual general meeting over and the upbeat speeches by both the Prime Minister and his Deputy during the meeting, we see a lot of comments and suggestions about the coming 13GE in the papers as well as in the internet.

The Opposition parties too have been quite up beat in their own speeches. The battle for control of Putrajaya has begun.

There are two political "forces" facing each other in Peninsular Malaya.

On the right is the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition partners, comprising of five political parties, namely, the United Malay National Organisation (UMNO), the Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA), the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC), the Gerakan Party and the Peoples Progressive Party (PPP).

The first three parties are communal parties, representing the three major races in the country.

UMNO is the biggest party in the country and the "pillar" of the BN coalition.

Gerakan is a splinter group of MCA and although multi-racial, it is Chinese-based.

The PPP is a splinter of the MIC, and although multi-racial in concept, it is also Indian-based.

The PPP was the party started by the two Senivasagam brothers of Perak in the 60s.

The BN coalition, including the BN political parties of Sabah and Sarawak, have 13 political parties joined together for a common stand to govern the country. The BN coalition has been in power ever since Malaya obtained its independence in 1957.

The BN coalition political symbol is the scale or timbangan; hitherto, the coalition was called the Grand Alliance Party symbolised by a sailing ship, but was changed to the bigger and wider represented BN in the early 70s.

On the left are the Opposition parties group together in a loose coalition called Pakatan Rakyat (PR), comprising the Party Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), the Democratic Action Party (DAP) and the Islamist party called PAS. This latter party is Kelantan-based and its avowed aim is to introduce Islamic syriah laws in the country, including the Hudud law. The DAP is multiracial but has Chinese as its predominant members. For a long time, the DAP was dominated by a "father and son" partnership, Mr Lim Kit Siang and Mr Lim Guan Eng. The party is now headed by a national chairman, Mr Karpal Singh with Lim Guan Eng as the Secretary general.

The latter is also presently the Chief Minister of Penang.

The two political "forces" (the BN and PR) in Peninsular Malaya are fighting for the control of the Federal Parliament and hence the Administrative centre at Putrajaya. At the last general election in 2008, the BN coalition in the Peninsula obtained 95 seats and the Opposition 75.

It was the Parliamentary seats won by the Sabah and Sarawak BN that helped the BN coalition to hold on to power.

Hence, Sabah and Sarawak were called the "fixed deposits States.

There is apparently a third "political force" found in the two Borneo States.

This is the Borneo Alliance (BA) comprising of the STAR of Sabah and Sarawak, the Sabah Action Peoples Party (SAPP) of Sabah and the USNO Baru presently led by Datu Baharuddin Tun Mustapha.

Sabah and Sarawak also have BN coalition parties and together with the BN coalition parties in the Peninsula number 13 parties altogether.

The Sabah BN is led by the Chief Minister, Datuk Seri Panglima Musa Haji Aman.

He is also the head of Sabah UMNO as well as the leader of the Sabah BN coalition parties.

The Sabah coalition party comprised of the three Peninsula based parties, UMNO, MCA and Gerakan. (MIC and PPP are not found in Sabah or Sarawak) and the Sabah based parties, namely, the United Pasok Momogun Kadazan Organisation (UPKO), with Tan Sri Bernard Dompok as its president, the Party Bersatu Sabah (PBS), led by Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan and the Party Bersatu Rayat Sabah (PBRS), led by Tan Sri Joseph Kurup. The third local party is the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) then led by Tan Sri Chong Kah Kiat but is presently led by Datuk V.K Liew.

Three of the four local parties are multi-racial in concept.

These are the PBS, Kadazandusun-based, PBRS, also Kadazandusun-based and the LDP, Chinese-based.

The main aim of these political adversaries is to capture the Federal parliament and the seat of Administration at Putrajaya, as well the State governments - of which there are 11 in the Peninsula and the two in Sabah and Sarawak.

Four of the States in the Peninsula are with the PR Opposition party; namely, Selangor (PKR led), Penang (DAP led), Kelantan (PAS led) and Kedah (PAS led). 9 other States (including Sabah and Sarawak) are in the governance of the BN coalition.

The BN coalition party stand is that its governance of the nation has been steadfast and true, and that it has delivered to the people and country what is best.

The BN coalition government stands for its record of service - good service - to the nation and people. It has brought peace and stability and in turn, brought in billions of ringgit in foreign investments to the country. This is a strong indication of foreigners' confidence in the governance of the BN coalition government.

And in Sabah too, the excellent financial management of the State's economy by the Chief Minister is also noted by both local and foreign investors. Foreign investments in Sabah too is in the billion of ringgit which in turn helped to develop the State as well as provide employment to the people.

Today, for instance, Malaysia is rated as the 8th best country in the world and the recent statistics show that the BN government in both Federal and State have slowly but surely eradicated poverty amongst the poor in the nation.

And in the fight against corruption, Malaysia's position today in the global graft perception index is 54th in the world - an improvement of six spots (from 60th). We are ranked ahead or above Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. In the ASEAN countries, Malaysia is rated as 3rd, Singapore as 1st and Brunei second.

So, in effect, the avowed aim of the Pakatan Rakyat to erase corruption in the country as one of its main policies if it gets to control Putrajaya has fallen flat as the BN coalition government is doing precisely this today and is achieving results. Indeed, the statistics also show that the MACC had achieved a big stride in the war on graft with the prosecution rate this year up from 75 per cent from last year.

Meanwhile, the Borneo Alliance objectives, they claimed, is to return the Borneo States to the original concept when the Federation of Malaysia was formed.

The concept and understanding then was that there were four countries forming the Federation of Malaysia - Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak. There was no mention, that Sabah and Sarawak would become one of the states or the 12th or the 13th.

The Malaysia agreement too needs to be rewritten. This is because the Malaysia agreement has become null and void when Singapore, an important signatory to the Agreement was expelled from the federation of Malaysia, they claim.

The big question is whether the super powers like the United Kingdom and the United States would listen and support this call?

I thought I saw someone from Sabah presenting the same view at the House of Commons (Parliament) in London some time back,

He was then backed and introduced by a British MP of Indian origin.

There was not a "ripple" seen or heard about that presentation.

The truth of the matter is that after so many years as part of the Federation of Malaysia, Sabahans today are generally happy and appreciative of the vast strides made in the economic and social developments in the State. Peoples' standard of living too have increased by leaps and bounds and the feeling of Kadazandusun Muruts being left "marginalised" is becoming more and more things of the past.

And for this, the efforts of our BN leaders, like the Chief Minister and the Prime Minister must be given due recognition for their caring attitude. And closer home, the KDM leaders in the BN coalition government, like Tan Sri Bernard Dompok must also be given due recognition of what he had contributed to the people - his people - to the country and State.

Tan Sri Bernard has been practically the main spokesman for the indigenous communities of Kadazandusun Murut in the Federal Cabinet.

Federal leaders have been "listening" and they have been very supportive of the call to assist the indigenous communities to better themselves and become proud Malaysians.