Parti Bersatu Sabah today rebutted the Sabah chief minister's statement that it was Barisan Nasional and not PBS who had secured the majority vote in Pulau Gaya, Likas, in the 1999 state elections.

The New Straits Times recently reported Chief Minister Chong Kah Kiat as saying that it was absurd for PBS to allege that BN was relying on phantom voters to win the Likas by-election this Saturday.

"Most of the phantom voters were said to be from Gaya island but in the last election the majority of the votes there were for the PBS," said Chong, who is also the president of Liberal Democratic Party, a component of the ruling BN coalition.

PBS secretary-general Radin Malleh countered Chong's claim, saying that the breakdown of the results from the three polling streams in Pulau Gaya showed 643 votes went to BN and only 69 went to PBS.

Renowned for being part of five islands forming the Tunku Abdul Rahman Marine Park, Pulau Gaya is, on the other hand, also notorious for its migrant settlement.

"Chong should not stoop that low [as to resort] to a political gimmick by giving a wrong fact, thereby tarnishing his position," said Radin in a press statement.

Yong Teck Lee of BN's Sabah Progressive Party won the Likas seat in the March 1999 state elections with a large majority of 4,962 votes.

But a by-election was called after the High Court Judge Muhammad Kamil Awang on June 8 ruled that the Likas electoral roll was illegal and that he was convinced of the existence of phantom voters in the constituency.

The Likas by-election on July 21 will see 26,195 eligible voters cast their votes.

Bogus voters

Radin urged the genuine voters of Likas to be aware of pengundi luar (bogus voters).

Sabah's population of some three million people includes an estimated 500,000 immigrants, mainly from neighbouring Indonesia and the Philippines.

Radin claimed that BN had mobilised 3,972 bogus voters in the Likas constituency alone in the last election.

"These pengundi luar are not residing in Likas," said Radin.

He further claimed that the bogus voters use fictitious names found in the electoral roll and are supplied with either fake identity cards or temporary identification documents for voting.

He told malaysiakini that the Elections Commission has not responded to PBS regarding the report lodged recently on 5,000 dubious voters found in the Likas electoral roll.

"The birth dates of these 5,000 dubious voters in the 2000 electoral roll are different from those in the 1998 electoral roll," he claimed, adding that he believed the dubious voters were registered through illegal means.