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Sabah cabinet: No reason for Tan to be there

I refer to the Malaysiakini report LDP tells PM to drop Sabah ministers .

I agree with Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Deputy President Chin Shu Pin's criticism of Raymond Tan.

Raymond Tan should not be retained in the state cabinet as deputy chief minister and minister of infrastructure development. He was appointed to these posts based on his affiliation to the Sabah Progressive Party (Sapp) after the general elections last year as Sapp was still a member of the ruling coalition at that time.

Now, that the Sapp has left Barisan Nasional (BN), there is no reason why he should remain in the cabinet. He has left Sapp, but to date he has yet to join any BN party.

When Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah (PBRS) dumped Dr Jeffrey Kitingan, he claimed to be still loyal to BN. There was even a front-page report in the Daily Express in which Kitingan claimed that he was a ‘BN-Independent'.

But again within the same week, the Daily Express carried another front-page report in which Chief Minister Musa Aman stated that there is no such thing as a ‘BN-Independent'.

Kitingan was not even a cabinet member at that time, but Musa chose to disown him on the basis that he was without a party.

Therefore, it is surprising for Musa to retain Tan as a BN representative and a cabinet member despite Tan being without a party.

When Sapp pulled out of BN last year and Tan quit BN, he said that he would form a new party. Until today he has remained an independent. Why then is Musa retaining him? Is this not double standards?

Musa once said that there is no such thing as a ‘BN-Independent' and today in his cabinet there is a ‘BN-Independent' who also happens to be his deputy.

This shows that Musa is unprincipled and biased. Perhaps he was afraid of the influence Kitingan. But if that is the case then just say so, not issue statements that he would later contradict.

I believe that Umno's rejection of Kitingan might have something to do with Musa. This is because, at first, Umno had accepted Kitingan. But later Umno decided to backtrack.

The reason cited by Umno was perhaps the stupidest excuse for rejecting Kitingan. They said they did not know that the applicant was 'the' Jeffrey Kitingan.

If Kitingan had remained in Umno, it would have been a threat to Musa as he (Kitingan) had considerable influence not only over the Kadazandusun and Murut but also the Muslim natives. This shows that Musa may indeed be a coward.

And as for Raymond Tan, I believe the honorable thing for him to do is to resign from the Sabah state cabinet.

The only reason he is being retained is because he quit Sapp and therefore an enemy of the opposition is a friend of the BN.

But his political future is clearly heading towards the dustbin.

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