A new team in the Sarawak National Party (Snap) will challenge the present group headed by the president James Wong Kim Min for control of the party at its triennial general assembly on Feb 28 next year.

This was disclosed today by the partys vice-president William Mawan, who led the walk-out by a group of all but one elected representatives yesterday from a crucial central executive committee meeting debating the fate of Bintulu member of Parliament Tiong King Sing.

The CEC meeting, chaired by Wong, voted to expel Tiong for alleged breach of party discipline. Two-thirds of the members supported the motion after nine members walked out on it.

Mawan, the state minister for environment and public health, told reporters yesterday that he had told the CEC it should not act as both jury and prosecutor at the same time and that an independent panel of inquiry should be set up with the involvement of both the president (Wong) and the secretary-general, Justine Jinggit.

He added that by sacking Tiong outright after his reply to the show-cause letter issued to him was found to be unsatisfactory by the committee, the party had denied the Bintulu MP the basic right of natural justice.

He described it as a bad precedent which would have a lot of implications for the party. It has also embarrassed the party in the eyes of their counterparts in the ruling Barisan Nasional front.

Mawan is widely speculated to take on Wong for the post of president at the forthcoming general assembly, although he declined to confirm this yesterday, merely saying, Lets us cross the bridge when we come to it.

But he confirmed that his group would be fielding a new team to take on the present group because there was growing internal dissatisfaction at the way the party was being run.

Isolated president

With all but one of its elected representatives — three MPs (Dr Tiki Lafe, Jacob Sagan, Peter Tinggom) and five state assembly representatives (William Mawan, Peter Nansian, Peter Nyarok, Dr Judson Tagal and Sylvester Entri) — on Mawans side, the presidents own group looks to be increasingly isolated and powerless.

None of the partys Chinese Malaysian leader is identified with Mawans group.

The decision of the partys deputy president Peter Tinggom, a former federal deputy minister, to side with Mawans group came as a surprise and was seen as a big blow to the president and his group. Tinggom is a senior party leader who is highly respected within the party and Iban community.

Meanwhile, according to a spokesperson, the partys 62 divisions throughout Sarawak would be sending between two and three delegates each to the partys general assembly next year.

Branch-level elections are now being held and will end in December.

The last time Wong was challenged was in 1983. His opponent, Leo Moggie, lost and eventually led his supporters to quit Snap and form the Parti Bansa Dayak Sarawak (PBDS).

Speculation is that history is likely to repeat itself, especially if Mawans group goes for broke and, like Moggies group before them, will also lose.

Under the partys constitution the president wields considerable power, especially over appointments and control over divisions and branches.

It is not known at this stage how many of the divisions each of the two groups could count on. But Mawan indicated confidence that a new team would replace the present group led by Wong.