Tuaran BN has vowed to teach incumbent MP and now Pakatan Rakyat candidate for the constituency, Wilfred Bumburing, a lesson for being a “traitor” to the ruling coalition.

"The people of Tuaran supported BN and when he won, he ran away with the seat.

NONE "The people of Tuaran know to differentiate between those who honour the rakyat's struggles and opportunistic ones who betray the rakyat's hopes," Tuaran BN chairperson Hajiji Noor said at a ceramah in the Sabah constituency last night.

Hajiji added that a victory in Tuaran would be a gift from the people to BN chief Najib Abdul Razak, so he could form the federal government in Putrajaya.

This was greeted by frenzied cheers of 'Tatap BN' (Remain with BN) of the audience of around 2,000, most in the blue BN T-shirts distributed during the event.

Hajiji, who is also BN's candidate for the Sulaman state seat under the parliamentary constituency, said Tuaran was not a stranger to the opposition.

He said PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim was a familiar face there, having been campaigning in the town, located about 35km from Kota Kinabalu, for several years now.

"But when he comes, the gathering of one to two thousand people  are made up of outsiders, and this (poor showing) is because of the good service provided by the BN representatives here," Hajiji said.

Wilfred vs Wilfred

Bumburing, who was then in BN component party Upko, won Tuaran in 2008 with a large majority of 6,622 votes against PKR's Ansari Abdullah, who has now been dropped from the PKR list.

azlan BN will field another Wilfred in Bumburing's place; Wilfred Madius Tangau from Upko. Madius won Tuaran for BN in 2004.

The state seats of Kiulu, Sulaman and Tamparuli were all won by BN with comfortable majorities, with Kiulu seeing the lowest margin of the three, with 1,266.

Muslim and non-Muslim bumiputera voters are split roughly evenly in Tuaran.

Many in the audience of all ages arrived on foot at the Dewan Seri Sulaman last night.

Some were seen carrying their young children on their shoulders to the event where BN deputy chairperson Muhyiddin Yassin was the guest of honour.

Also present were Sabah Umno chief and caretaker state Chief Minister Musa Aman.