Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.
– Richard Armour, American poet
Imagine this. It took just one Umno assemblyman, Tan Sri Musa Aman, to attempt a coup against the Sabah government and it almost succeeded.
We have to give it to the Sungai Sibuga assemblyman. This is how influential and powerful Musa still is. He was the sole Umno assemblyman left standing after 16 of his party colleagues who won in GE14 left the party.
On July 30, all the 16 returned to support Musa. A total of 33 state assembly members (including himself) were on his side. I doubt the widely-circulated photo of the 33 state reps was a fake.
How he managed to get the numbers is anyone’s guess. Let’s just surmise that frogs will be frogs.
Musa also claimed that all the deserters wanted him to return to lead Sabah as chief minister. Here, we are talking about a party with a single assemblyman — a lone ranger.
By convention, isn’t the leader of the party with the most seats gets to be the CM? Now, what is going on? Pretty confusing for the layman, isn’t it?
I think that Sabah Governor Tun Juhar Mahiruddin had wisely allowed the dissolution of the state assembly to pave the way for fresh elections. He must have concluded that the best way to resolve the political crisis was to let Sabahans decide.
However, I doubt the good people of Sabah will emerge the winner, irrespective of the outcome of the elections, expected within 60 days.
By the way things have been moving over the past few days, it is likely that the majority of the elected reps, including turncoats and traitors, will get to run again.
Sabah is a state synonymous with political frogs and over the past 27 months, Chief Minister Datuk Mohd Shafie Apdal hardly had any peace — there was too much wheeling and dealing behind his back.
In this column on June 24, I wrote about the “Typhoon in Land below the Wind”, and speculated that with horse-trading still ongoing, one couldn’t help but wonder how much longer Shafie is able to withstand the political typhoon fiercely blowing straight across his proud state.
“Only time will tell”, I added.
That period came fast and furious — within 36 days.
I don’t think I’m way off to state that this long-standing clash between Shafie and Musa, Sabah’s two most powerful warlords, is a key factor for the political turmoil today.
Why should 3.8 million Sabahans be made to suffer by having to go through another electoral process just because of the personal feud of their top political leaders?
Shafie himself had said it.
“Every now and then, he or his followers would kacau (disturb) and attempt to entice crossovers of our state reps”.
Why must Sabahans suffer just because 60 (the total number of elected state reps) among them were more keen to slug it out with each other because of selfish motivations and lust for position and power. To these dishonourable politicians, the interests of Sabahans were never their concern at all.
Now, many party leaders have started to repeat the same promise of fielding credible and trustworthy candidates as the state polls loom.
Sabah PPBM chairman Datuk Hajiji Noor has declared that his party will field winnable and credible candidates in 45 seats. State PKR chairwoman Christina Liew apologised for the betrayal by some of her party’s reps and promised to make good by not repeating the same mistake of fielding disloyal and untrustworthy candidates.
Upko president Datuk Wilfred Madius Tangau explained that some of the Upko traitors were not the party’s preferred candidates in GE14 but that he was forced to accept them due to pressure from the top BN leaders prior to the elections. He assured his preferred candidates this time around would be loyal and credible personalities.
Shafie was right to state recently that “based on experience, the (same) people and parties which have been in power for 20 years and more are unlikely or difficult to change”.
Sabahans will not gain anything from the coming elections because the lack of ideology has already ruined our politics.
I doubt political parties today are driven by an ideology. If theyare, turncoats and traitors will be unheard of. Anyone trying to cross the floor would be looked down upon and ostracised from the political arena.
In Sabah today, and the country too, there is no more shame among even the most treacherous of them all.
Sickening, isn’t it?
The views expressed here are those of the columnist and do not necessarily represent the views of New Sarawak Tribune.
Feedback can reach him at tribunenew2019@gmail.com
