Now, the talk of the town is all about Umno and the general assembly. The banning of Mohd Rustam Ali will add numerous variables to the election of the Umno top posts and their supreme council.

But I am sceptical that this general assembly will be the beginning of a make-over of this once most powerful political party in Malaysia. You cannot really teach new tricks to an old dog. The actors may change, but the script and the plot have been etched in stone.

Being the only Sarawakian on the Malaysiakini writing team, I feel obliged to continue commenting on the Batang Ai by-election. I am quite certain many Pakatan Rakyat supporters in Peninsular Malaysia are hungry for news from the other side of the South China Sea.

Again, the Sarawak bloggers prove to be a valuable source of all kinds of information that will never be carried by the mainstream papers.

law conference lingam tape 311007 haris ibrahim I did made a trip back to Sarawak last weekend with Har is Ibrahim ( right ), Zorro Unmasked and Delcapo for an exploratory visit to see how we could hook up with the Sarawak bloggers.

We met up with quite a few of their Sarawak counterparts; some of them took the Barisan Rakyat team all the way to the longhous es in Batang Ai.

The visitors were even taken to PKR candidate Jawah Gerang’s longhouse, where Haris had the honour and courage of handling some skulls.

Upon their return, these three gentlemen expressed their satisfaction with the trip, saying that the visit was more than productive.

Meanwhile, q uite a few Barisan Rakyat bloggers are on a staggered scheduled to fly over to Kuching, on their way to Batang Ai, to campaign, observe, and perhaps to blog. I hope their visit will be an alternative way of forging national integration.

Betting on elections

But the Sarawak blogsphere is still buzzing with all kinds of alternative news.

On his latest posting, Audie61 had this latest tit-bit on the betting world. Before the PKR announced its candidate, the betting was in favour of BN, giving a handicap of 1,000 votes even. But now, it is betting on the PKR candidate, giving a handicap of 78 cents to the ringgit to BN in favour of PKR’s Jawah.

pkr batang ai sarawak state election campaign 100309 06 I contested as a candidate eight times in Kuching, and the massive betting often made me feel like a race horse, or a fighting cock. Betting on election results is illegal and immoral, but you try telling that to the compulsive gamblers! One of my supporters lost an entire house!

Many Ibans love to bet on cock fights, and some have lost their land over such a seemingly harmless pastime. They may just indulge the mselves on the tw o fighting cocks in the by-election.

Betting can also be used to influence the outcome of the Batang Ai by-election.

The latest betting trend narrated by Audie61 seems to work against the PKR candidate, and so could be the work of a wealthy conglomerate trying to in flu ence the outcome of polling on April 7.

Meanwhile, in his latest posting on The Broken Shield , Joseph Tawie reported that two local Iban individuals - Johnny Chuat and Linang Merujun - may also enter the fray as individuals. In any election or by-election, you always get indivi duals like that whose head gets feverish and bloated.

Joseph Tawie also made some worrisome revelation of the carrot-and-stick tac tic applied on the community leaders and village chiefs of Batang Ai.

alfred “Last week, Deputy Chief Minister and deputy president of PBB Alfred Jabu Numpang gave lectures to about 100 tuai rumah (village heads) in the Batang Ai constituency.

"Yesterday (March 22), PRS state assemblyman Snowdan Lawan of Balai Ringin also lectured 39 t

uai rumah from Batang Ai and told them they “are part of the governme nt and therefore have an important role to play”. They must show good example by not inciting their own people to go against BN and must tell their “anembiaks” to vote for BN. Later the tuai rumah was given a free and guided tour of Kuching.

"On March 14, several tuai rumah from Batang Ai were asked to meet MP for Sri Aman, Masir Kujat who told them that they were “eyes and ears” of the BN and report to BN any “suspicious” characters who are trying to get their support for the opposition.

"Today, several more tuai rumah were asked to meet deputy president of PRS Joseph Entulu Belaun and to receive their “angpows” of minor rural projects. Wai FM (RTM Iban) made the announcement that they must see the deputy minister this afternoon.”

Elect the tuai rumah

If past practice in Sarawak is a guide, these tuai rumah will be summoned by BN people a few days before polling. They will be instructed on how to vote, and then a large sum of money will be given to them, to be distributed among the voters in their respective longhouse on polling eve.

Perhaps, the voters will be given a small deposit first, and a large sum will await them if the BN manok (cock) wins eventually.

pkr batang ai sarawak state election campaign 100309 08 The tuai rumah is appointed by the government, often on the recommendation of the local BN elected rep, is answerable to the district officer, and gets paid RM450 a month. They are also the most authoritative figure in the longhouse. Naturally, the BN will use them as mere tools to enslave the Iban people.

Sarawak PKR should make the pledge to return political independence to the Dayak people in Sarawak , by promising that, should they come to power, the village chiefs should be democratically elected by the villagers themselves before they are recognised by the state government.

jamilah taib ottawa palace 2 Another worthy Sarawak blogger, Sarawak Head-hunter reproduced a story f rom Michael Prentice of the Canadian newspaper the Ottawa Citizen (Jan 19, 2009) . I checked the Ottawa Citizen Online and found the story to be authentic as Sarawak Head-hunter had quoted.

The original report in the Canadian newspaper reveals that Sean Murray and his wife Jamilah Taib own the second most expensive mansion in Ottawa, valued at something like RM28 million.

Murray is a developer, so h e may be independently wealthy. But Jamilah Taib is the daughter of Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud. Most informed Sarawakians know roughly about the wealth and the opulent lifestyle of the Taib clan.

Exactly how much they have in terms of timber concessions, land, corporate holdings, and personal cash is a matter of speculation; their collective wealth must be greater than whatever you can think of. Aga in, go check out Sarawak Head-hunter’s latest posting.

Sarawak is a resource rich state, and the people are among the poorest in the whole country. One wonders why?

During my recent trip to Kuching, I bumped into an old friend who is a plumber by profession. Naturally, our conversati on over a cup of excellent coffee peculiar to Sarawak turned to politics.

He declared that the number one problem in Sarawak is the termite.

Seeing the puzzlement on my face, he explained, ”The termite is the most pestilential pest on earth. It eats everything despite its small size. It eats even sh##! In Mandarin, the word ‘termite’ is pronounced as Bai Ma Yi!”

War against termites

barisan nasional taib mahmud The light came to my dumb skull at last, and we had a good laugh. 'Bai Ma Yi' in Mandarin sounds pretty close to 'White Hair', the universal nickname given to the CM of my home state by his disloyal subjects.

There has been some discussion of what the issue ought to be highlighted by the PKR at the Batang Ai by-election.

For me though, there is only one issue at hand, at the Batang Ai by-election and any future election for that matter. All elections in Sarawak for blue-blooded Anak Sarawak are an exercise in extermination of the termite outrage. If the BN candidate Malcolm Mussen gets elected, he will just be another junior termite.

I am enraged to see this army of senior and junior termites descending upon Batang Ai, playing their scratched record of politics of development.

The poverty level for Sarawakians is RM540 per month per household. I doubt too many poor Ibans in Batang Ai are above the poverty level. As they get poorer, the insatiable swarm of termites get richer.

The contest in Batang Ai is not merely between PKR and PRS, or between Malcolm Mussen and Jawah Garang. It is a small battle in a long war between the people of Sarawak against the termites in the fair Land of the Hornbill.

Finally, I am tired of talking about Sarawak bloggers. Together with a group of like-minded friends from all ethnic communities, we have just started our new kid on the Sarawak blog the Hornbill Unleashed .

Our guiding principle is Anak Sarawak, Bangsa Malaysia.

Agi idup, agi ngeleban!

SIM KWANG YANG was opposition MP for Bandar Kuching in Sarawak from 1982 to 1995. He can be reached at kenyalang578@hotmail.com.