Darell’s aide downplays tussle for Warisan No. 2
KOTA KINABALU: An official from Parti Warisan Sabah yesterday dismissed the comment made by an analyst, Arnold Puyok that the party is vulnerable to split due to rumours about the battle for the deputy president post.
According to Christopher Masudal who is the special officer to Datuk Darell Leiking, there is no hostility between Leiking and Anthony and both are friendly to each other.
“I believe the rumours were actually being spread by those who have been indoctrinated with the ‘divide and rule’ concept made famous by Barisan Nasional that had ruled Sabah for 24 years, so it is understandable that they may need some time to accept the fact that in order for the new Sabah to progress, racial or ethnic polarization should make way for ‘Bangsa Sabah’.
“So my advice to party members on this matter is not to immediately engage in emotional racial discourse and to use ‘race’ or ‘ethnicity’ just to win a debate.
“In fact, I came across an online portal news on the same issue which Puyok had highlighted so it may be very well that some people are simply jealous with the exceptional results that Datuk Darell had achieved as the Minister of International Trade and Industry, hence they want to instigate party members and destroy Warisan from within,” he said in a statement yesterday.
Masudal also rubbished the contention made by Puyok that Warisan lacks strong ideology or platform on multiracialism.
“How can this be? During the GE14 election campaign, Warisan was bombarded with the accusation of being a Suluk or PTI party but it stood tall and leaders in the likes of Datuk Darell, Loretto Padua Jr., Datuk Junz Wong and Terrence Siambun fought the vicious racist attacks made against the Suluk ethnic. If defending another indigenous in Sabah is not being considered as the best portrayal of multiracialism, then I don’t know what it is,” he argued.
“In fact, Puyok may well remember it how his analysis back on May 2, 2018 during a talk held by Nottingham University was way off mark when he opined that Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal was not getting support within the Kadazan, Dusun and Murut communities and Warisan will fail to make an impact at areas held by these ethnic groups.
Hence, his analysis on the current political dynamics happening in Warisan which the online news itself admittedly stated is based on rumours and hearsay may very well be wrong too,” he added.
When asked about the racial politics in Sabah, Masudal said that party members should prevent it from taking root in Warisan because it may cause the downfall of not only the party but the current State Government.
“We have seen so many times the KDM leaders use KDM as an issue to fool people and at the end, only these KDM leaders benefitted whilst the KDM as a whole suffered.
“We’ve seen this when the BN Sabah leaders were in power back then, so, if we once again make race or ethnicity as the pivotal point of our political struggle because of the ‘fear of being left out’, then we allow ourselves to be deceived once again.
Young Malaysians from West Malaysia irrespective of whether they’re Malays, Chinese or Indians believed that the ‘fear of being left out’ tactic had actually never benefited them particularly in terms of economic, education or social progressions so in GE14, they vented out their frustration and caused the collapse of Umno and total annihilation of MCA and MIC, Masudal said.
The same pattern could be seen in Sabah too where several KDM based leaders from BN were defeated, he added.
“So racial politics is not the key to success anymore and it may very well the key to failure,” he contended.
“As the Government of the Day, our immediate task is not to make the race or ethnic group that we belong to respectively as the most superior ones in Sabah but to develop Sabah and make Sabahans prosperous. Sabah did that once during the Berjaya administration in 1976 and Johor is now reminding us that this can be done.”
“This is what Datuk Darell has stood for all this while and had never used the political platform as a Kadazan or KDM leader; like Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal who has taken the role as President of Warisan as a leader for all Sabahans, Datuk Darell had also assumed the role of the deputy president as the leader for all Sabahans. This is further enhanced by Datuk Darell’s role as the Minister of International Trade and Industry who as a Sabahan, is a Malaysia’s Minister for the Federation.”
“Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal has been stressing that race politics is over and we must stand up for all Sabahans as this is the way for us to rebuild Sabah with the Federation.”
In less than 10 years, Masudal said Johor had become an economic super-power in Malaysia because they embraced the concept of Bangsa Johor.
“But what will happen to Sabah? Until and unless we embrace the concept of Bangsa Sabah, then we will still be weak and poor because we prioritize race or ethnicity in our political struggle instead of Sabah as whole,” he concluded.