Harapan Rakyat registered through proper channel
KOTA KINABALU: The registration of Parti Harapan Rakyat Sabah went through the proper channel and the process took 39 days, not four and a half days as claimed by Parti Cinta Sabah (PCS) president Datuk Seri Panglima Wilfred Bumburing.
This was made clear bythe Harapan Rakyat’s protem committee led by its protem president, Patrick Sadom, to the media yesterday.
Sadom who is now one of the party’s vice presidents was accompanied by Harapan Rakyat’s deputy protem president Ashim Jamat and Bakir Mancaing, its protem treasurer.
Also present at the press conference were its vice president Datuk James Ghani, deputy secretary General Edmund Doudilim and party leaders.
Sadom claimed that Bumburing had lied when asking Harapan Rakyat’s president about the party’s registration.
“We took 39 days to apply to have the party registered. The application was submitted on Sept 14, 2016 and approved on Oct 24, 2016. The never-ending accusations and lies directed at Harapan Sabah shows that we are a force to contend with in Gabungan Sabah,” he said.
He claimed that other opposition parties have twisted the facts about Harapan Rakyat and its struggles.
This is something that he is disappointed with as the opposition should be united as their common enemy is Barisan Nasiona (BN), not among themselves.
“But it seems that our opposition comrades are taking the opportunity to accuse us of being a BN agent. But you can see that many Umno members have opted to join us. If we are a BN agent, I don’t think we will accept Umno members, we would be getting members from other opposition parties,” he stressed.
To the question on why the accusations against Harapan Rakyat and Gabungan Sabah never stops, Sadom said, “to me it is because the presidents of the parties in Gabungan Sabah have not been implicated in scandals involving abuse of power.
“So this is political competition among the opposition that is why they use the recycled issue of Harapan Rakyat being a BN agent,” he said and stressed that Harapan Rakyat’s struggles for the people of Sabah and their rights are consistent and this is the same for other component parties in Gabungan Sabah.
Ashim added that there are opposition parties in Sabah trying to get political mileage by misleading the people through all sorts of accusation.
“We in Gabungan Sabah do not want to go through this cheap way of getting popularity. We are offering value-based politics as we have many issues to address in Sabah, not just merely accusing each other.
“If we do that, the one who will benefit is BN. We are annoyed by these kind of accusations. By right we should be focusing on resolving the issues. In Gabungan Sabah we are very focused and we will do out best for Sabahans and that is our stand.
“We go all out for the benefit of the people of Sabah, not to play cheap politics,” Ashim stressed.
On the matter of seat allocation in the coming 14th general election, Sadom said that the decison will be made by the council of presidents in Gabungan Sabah and they have said that there will be no problem with allocation.
He added that Parti Kebangsaan Sabah (PKS) had not reached out to them seeking to work together in the election.