DEPUTY Premier Datuk Amar Dr Sim Kui Hian paid tribute to the late Tun Pehin Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud for maintaining Sarawak’s political stability through the partnership of the ruling parties, especially with Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP), during the latter’s tenure as chief minister.
Apart from political development, the SUPP president said the late Taib’s chief ministership also resulted in social and religious harmony in Sarawak.
The former governor’s legacy, he said, was based on political parties governing Sarawak rather than letting peninsular parties such as the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) and Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA) come to Sarawak.
“Tun was my late father, Tan Sri Datuk Amar Sim Kheng Hong’s political partner, leader of the cabinet, a family friend, and our Sarawak Heart Foundation chairman.
“Tun was the main initiator responsible for the relocation of cardiac services from Sarawak General Hospital to Samarahan, as well as its operations under the Ministry of Health Malaysia rather than under University Malaysia Sarawak in 2001.
“After the late Datuk Amar Laila Taib passed away in 2009, he took over as chairman of the Sarawak Heart Foundation and had always focused on how to help the cardiac services in the Sarawak Heart Centre and the cardiac patients. I learned a lot from Tun’s strategic planning during the board meetings over the years,” he said.
He said this when debating in support of the motion of appreciation to the former Head of State today.
Sim remembered that Taib used to share the latter’s visions of Sarawak and various advices after he became the governor.
“Never listen to what a person says. Study his or her characters,” was the advice of the late Taib, said Dr. Sim.
“He (the late Taib) used to tell me, ‘Many people come to me saying bad things about you. I told them, I know Dr Sim since small. Do you know him as well as I do?’.”
