The five 'partyless' elected representatives of deregistered Parti Bansa Dayak Sarawak (PBDS) have expressed their wish to join en bloc a Barisan Nasional component party to Prime Minister and BN chairperson Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

The request was conveyed personally to Abdullah during a 30-minute meeting at the Prime Minister's Department in Putra Jaya at 5pm yesterday afternoon by four of the elected representatives - Kanowit MP Aaron Dagang, Lubok Antu MP Jawah Gerang, Ngemah state assemblyperson Gabriel Adit and Belaga state assemblyperson Stanley Ajang.

Absent was Deputy Foreign Minister Joseph Salang, who is the Julau MP, as he is away overseas on an official visit in Prague, Czechoslavakia.

Present at the meeting was former PBDS president Leo Moggie, who is also Tenaga Nasional non-executive chairperson. Moggie later had a four-eye meeting with the prime minister.

Sources close to the group today told malaysiakini that Abdullah was generally agreeable to the request, saying he would talk to Sarawak Chief Minister and state BN chairperson Abdul Taib Mahmud about it.

Nine in PRS

PBDS had 14 elected representatives - eight state assemblypersons and six MPs - when the party was deregistered for the second time on Oct 21 after what Home Minister Azmi Khalid said was failure of the two rival factions to come to a compromise to save the party through fresh elections.

Nine of them have since joined the newly-formed Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS), whose interim president is Sidi Munan, a former Iban civil servant turned politician.

State land development minister Dr James Masing will take over as party president in January next year with former PBDS vice-president Sng Chee Hua as his deputy.

Last week Taib's Parti Pesaka Bumiputra Bersatu Sarawak (PBB) supreme council met and announced that their recommendation was for the five remaining YBs to consider the first option of joining PRS.

(PRS has yet to be formally accepted into the BN, although its application has been endorsed by the state BN and admission is considered only as a formality now).

PBB decision

However, they said they also had the options of considering other component parties - PBB, Sarawak United People's Party (Supp) and Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP).

According to sources, Taib had sent PBB secretary-general Ambrose Blikau to talk to Salang and his group after the PBB meeting, and it was believed that the PBB decision was conveyed to them, leaving them to consider other options as well.

The group had indicated to Blikau that they would continue to support BN and would prefer to join en bloc the party willing to take them in. "PBB has been mentioned," sources told malaysiakini.

Talk is that the five could either join PBB or SPDP, which is also a Dayak-based party with nine elected representatives - four MPs and five state assemblypersons.