Yahya: Claims made to incite hatred towards Anifah

PUTATAN: The allegations about Foreign Affairs Minister Datuk Anifah Aman were made merely to incite hatred towards the Umno politician, claimed Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Seri Panglima Yahya Hussin.

"It is not true, whatever they say is meant to fire up or raise bad feelings, prejudice towards our own people," Yahya responded when asked by the press here yesterday.

"We do not want to act that way. We are a party that want all races to unite. We do not want to bring up the origin or prejudice against others, ours or whatever races.

"This is their (Parti Warisan Sabah) way to raise hatred towards a leader or party," he alleged.

Parti Warisan Sabah (Warisan) president Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal recently said that the party will bring Anifah, who is also Kimanis Member of Parliament, to court.

Shafie, at the Sabah Hope Center Chinese New Year event in Kota Kinabalu, told the press that this will be done after sorting out the costs involved to do so.

The party's secretary general, Loretto Padua Jr, had initially lodged a police report against the federal minister on February 14, urging the authority to run a fair investigation into the matter.

According to the report, Padua claimed that he had listened to a phone audio recording on February 12 of Anifah allegedly insinuating that Warisan members or its leader were not fit to run the state as they are not pure Sabahans.

He purported that Anifah said this in front of some 300 guests at a Chinese New Year dinner at a hotel in Kota Kinabalu on February 9.

Other party members also lodged a similar police report shortly after.

Meanwhile, two other police reports were lodged against two Warisan leaders on February 19.

The reports were done by Anifah's political secretary Datuk Jihek Basanu against Padua, and by veteran Umno member Abdul Jalil Abdul Ghani over a video of Warisan vice president Datuk Peter Anthony speaking in Matunggong on February 14.