Sekong may prove dicey for BN in GE14?
SANDAKAN: Talk on the ground here has it that opposition parties are having a hard time deciding on a candidate for the Batu Sapi parliamentary seat in the coming 14th general election (GE14) as there are many contenders among them.
According to reliable sources, among those wishing to vie for the seat are Warisan's Datuk Liew Vui Keong, Pg Roslan Pg Nasrun and David Fong, and Parti Amanah Malaysia (Amanah) Sabah chairman Hamzah Abdullah and PAS' Sahar Abdul Majid.
While the opposition parties vying for the Batu Sapi parliamentary seat may need some electoral agreement and hard work to avoid splitting votes among themselves, the Sekong state seat which is within the parliamentary constituency may see only Warisan representing the opposition in a straight fight with Barisan Nasional (BN).
It is reliably learnt that Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) Sandakan chairman Tommy Yap, who is keen to contest the Sekong state seat has made way for Warisan, while the Democratic Action Party (DAP) does not have a candidate for the seat.
Although the candidates' names have not been officially revealed, public opinion and reliable sources appear to indicate that Warisan secretary Arifin Asgali may likely be nominated to contest the Sekong state seat.
If chosen, Arifin may be contesting against incumbent Datuk Samsudin Yahya should the latter be put up to defend the seat.
Samsudin has been the Sekong assemblyman for 15 years after having won the last three elections.
However, this time around, grassroots' sentiments indicate that it could be an uphill battle for BN to retain the seat should Samsudin be renominated by the BN leadership.
Gerakan Suara Anak Muda Sabah chairman Al Hazlan Al Sarip claimed that Samsudin had lost support of the majority of the residents in Sekong, especially of the Bajau, who make up about 60 percent of the residents there since last year.
According to Al Hazlan, it all started when Samsudin failed to address the electricity problems faced by the villagers in Kampung Bakau and Kampung Sundang Laut.
In March 2017, the two villages suffered as a result of electricity disconnection for over 10 days when the company appointed by Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd (SESB), C3 Power, failed to pay the electricity bill for the villages.
The villages were unable to get their electricity supply directly from SESB as it was not gazetted as a legal village yet.
As of today, the two villages along with five other villages in Sekong are still categorised as squatter settlements.
Samsudin has gone to the ground to listen to the cry of the villagers, and several steps have been taken since.
In September last year, Samsudin agreed to take charge of collecting electricity supply payment from the villagers to submit to SESB while waiting for another company to replace C3 Power.
But in December last year, SESB disconnected the power supply to the villages again as it had about RM11,000 overdue payment. An UMNO member in the area took action to pay the overdue payment to SESB, before the power is reconnected again.
In February this year, the power supply to the villages was again disconnected. This time, SESB stated that it had RM23,000 overdue payment.
The villagers suffered two weeks of living without power supply, until their heroine this time, Batu Sapi member of parliament, Datuk Linda Tsen Thau Lin, took action to pay all the overdue payment whereby power is reconnected until today.
“So the question now is, what have Samsudin contributed to solve the electricity supply problem? One UMNO member and Datuk Linda took action to help the residents pay the overdue payments, but then what did Samsudin do?
He helped to collect the electricity payment from the villagers, but the way the bill payment was collected was not even systematic. No receipt was issued to the villagers, after which they (the villagers) were suddenly surprised with a huge overdue amount to pay SESB despite having paid their bills.
“These villagers are Malaysians, they are also voters. What has Samsudin done to make their village recognised as a legal village? We do not see any paper work or update from Samsudin on the matter. He has not informed us if he had dealt with the Land and Survey Department or not.
“For this, I am sure the locals are angry at him and he will definitely lose the local support. I see a huge difference between last election and this time. Last time, UMNO had a huge support, but this time, everyone seems to be supporting Warisan.
“Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal is like a Bajau hero to them. Back then, we do not have other choices except for Umno, because the other parties are usually Chinese-based parties. This time with Warisan, it is a different story. So unless Umno changes its candidate for Sekong, the locals are not going to support Umno,” he said.
On the other side of the coin, Samsudin may have done his possible best to resolve the villagers' electricity problem. For a village to be gazetted as an official village may take years to process. He had also taken responsibility to collect electricity payment of the villagers, which is not an easy task; given that it is the first time that the assemblyman had taken such task, a task that even an officially appointed company (C3 Power) had failed to do.
A reliable source from SESB once told The Borneo Post that SESB had refused to take on the responsibility of collecting electricity payment from the villagers in consideration for the safety of their personnel when entering the villages to collect money.
Aside from Samsudin, locals pointed out that Shamsul Kelana Samlee from UMNO, who is also vice president of the Welfare and Culture Association of Bajau Simunul, may gain support of the locals with his current followers and supporters if he was to be chosen. However, the possibility of Shamsul to be chosen as a candidate may be slim as Shamsul has insisted to remain as an UMNO member with no official position in the party.
Meanwhile, this writer went to Kampung Istimewa in Sekong, Batu Sapi here last week and saw a house with a huge Warisan banner on its wall. Shafie had a breaking of fast event at the same location in June last year.
On Tuesday, Samsudin had posted on his social media Facebook account the status: “Kampung Istimewa will continue to be BN's fort, now and forever” and attached a picture of him visiting the village with his entourage holding the BN flags behind him.