PPP keep off Sarawak - Tengah

Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hassan

PBB senior veep advises PPP to focus on winning in the peninsula and follow Umno’s footsteps in not spreading here
SEMATAN: People’s Progressive Party (PPP) should emulate Umno by not spreading its wings to Sarawak, said PBB senior vice–president Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hassan.
He said Umno as Barisan Nasional’s (BN) backbone had many times assured its state BN component parties, notably PBB, that it would not spread its wings to the state.
“They should just concentrate on their backyard in Peninsular Malaysia and not spread their wings here. They should emulate Umno instead, after all Umno is the backbone of BN in the country,” Awang Tengah told The Borneo Post after launching the Sematan Community Broadband Centre, some 140 km from Kuching yesterday.
Awang Tengah, who is also Second Minister of Planning and Resource Management, stressed that PPP should instead galvanise whatever resources it has and try to win all the seats allocated to it in peninsular Malaysia.
In the last general election held in 2008, PPP lost all the seats it contested including Taiping parliamentary seat which its president Datuk Seri M Kayveas contested.
“I can’t see the point why they are so eager to come over to Sarawak, as they can’t even win any seat in peninsular Malaysia,” he added.
Awang Tengah pointed out that the state already had four BN parties for the people to choose from and there was no need for anymore BN component parties from the peninsular to come over.
“We already have PBB, PRS, SPDP and SUPP here. Sarawakians have enough choices from the four BN component parties,” he asserted.
When launching PPP’s community outreach project at Kota Sentosa here last Saturday, Kayveas was quoted as saying that PPP had already set up its branches in 13 constituencies that are SUPP’s traditional seats.
It also claimed that it already has some 50,000 registered members.
Other BN component parties, including SUPP, have also voiced similar dissatisfaction over PPP’s move.
SUPP deputy secretary–general Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh was quoted as saying that SUPP was still relevant for the Chinese community and PPP’s presence would just confuse voters.
Wong also questioned PPP’s claim that some 50 per cent of its members are Chinese.