Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP), the second most powerful in the state BN after Parti Pesaka Bumiputra Bersatu, has been accused of having no guts to stand up to Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud.

chong chieng jen interview 141108 01 “SUPP will not say ‘No’ to whatever Taib wants on many issues, even though it does not agree (with him),” Sarawak DAP secretary Chong Chieng Jen (left) claimed today.

“The party even has lost autonomy on the selection of its candidates for the upcoming state election.”

Chong, the Bandar Kuching member of parliament and state assemblyperson for Kota Sentosa, cited the selection of the candidate for Padungan as clear  example of this.

“SUPP’s candidate for Padungan is 99 percent the mayor of  Kuching South City Council James Chan because he is the person identified by Taib.

“(The party) has no guts to reject Taib’s wishes. It is scared of Taib, that is why its leaders dare not challenge him...SUPP can only kowtow (to Taib).”

Chong said Chan would officially be SUPP’s candidate, but in reality he would be Taib’s man.

NONE “Taib (right) , at the Chinese New Year open house of Kuching South City Council last week, had hinted very strongly that he wanted Chan to contest,” he said.

Chong also accused SUPP of not being truthful in regard to resolving problems faced by landowners.

He said the party had made three major announcements that all problems relating to land issues had been resolved, but that this is not true.

“We have been asking the government to amend the Sarawak Land Code (to provide) for automatic renewal of the land lease upon expiry; and to amend Section 47 of the Code to limit the freezing of any land for a period of two years.

“The government should return the land to the owners if it does not want to use such land after two years.”

He said many plots of lands earmarked for town extension or public purposes have been placed under Section 47 for years, some as long as 30 years.

This is most unfair to the owners as they cannot develop their property, he said.

Seat allocation talks

Chong said the DAP and its Pakatan Rakyat partners will explain the failures of the BN state government when campaigning during the upcoming state election.

Saying that the DAP is ready to face the election, which some think could be held as early as April, Chong said the people must be prepared for change.

He said the deciding factor as to who will emerge victors will be based on which coalition can come up with pragmatic policies for the people.

“We have proven that Pakatan can manage the government better than BN as seen in the four states ruled by Pakatan governments (in the peninsula),” he noted.

azlan “There has been no fundamental change in BN polices, in spite of the so-called Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) and New Economic Model (NEM) announced by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak.”

He said the ETP and NEM are just empty slogans and that corruption, cronyism, nepotism and abuse of power still exist.

He said the federal government continues with wasteful spending, for example, on the purchase of navy patrol vessels at RM6 billion.

Chong suggested that savings from the reduction of subsidies on essential goods are meant to finance such purchases, which “are not essential items”.

On seat allocation within Pakatan, Chong said a few glitches need to be ironed out.

“But I don’t think there will be any problem for DAP, PKR, PAS and Sarawak National Party to reach an agreement,” he said.

Chong said he does not want to speculate on the number of seats the DAP will contest, as the final list will be decided by the Pakatan leadership.