DAP candidate not attending Bersih's by-election forum

SANDAKAN: Democratic Action Party (DAP) candidate for the Sandakan parliamentary byelection, Vivian Wong Shir Yee, has indicated that she will not be attending the by-election forum organised by Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (BERSIH) that is to be held today.

Vivian said she could not fit the programme into her tight schedule that had been pre-planned with no room for adjustment.

“It is not that I think the forum is not important, definitely not. I really could not slot in any more time. I had a discussion with my campaign manager and we decided that we could not mess up the schedule that had already been planned way ahead.

“It is not that the forum is not important. We were informed at the last minute, so we could not accept,” she said.

Out of five candidates in the byelection, only three candidates, all independent candidates, will be present at the forum, namely, Hamzah Abdullah, Chia Siew Yung and Sulaiman Abdul Samad.

The other two candidates are Wong and Datuk Linda Tsen Thau Lin of Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS).

DAP is one of five founding parties of Bersih in 2005, and the party had often fought for a forum and talk to be organised prior to an election. Bersih, through its website www.bersih.org, had issued a press release on the forum announcing with regret that the candidates from PBS and DAP could not join the forum due to a busy schedule.

The statement then invited members of the public to attend the forum which will be held today at Labuk Hotel, Bandar Labuk Jaya at 10 am. For further information, the public could reach Asraf at 0145724007.