The prime minister was surprised, the chief minister was shocked - this was their reaction after hearing from a Supp leader that the predominantly Chinese party is going to lose some seats in Sarawak in the coming elections.

Sources told Malaysiakini that Commodities and Plantation Industries Minister and Supp organising secretary Peter Chin Fah Kui mentioned this during a BN meeting late on Monday night in Miri.

Present were Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud, state ministers and all BN elected representatives.

A component party leader who attended the meeting said Chin's statement appeared to have come as 'a bit of surprise' to Abdullah and 'probably shock' to Taib and Supp president Dr George Chan.

The Youth chief of a component party who was also present confirmed what transpired.

The local media had earlier quoted Taib as saying that the state BN would deliver all the 31 parliamentary seats in the coming elections, widely expected to be held early next year.

"If Taib was not amused (by Chin's comments), it is quite understandable," the sources said.

Abdullah then advised Supp to set its election machinery in motion immediately to address the issue.

Supp, Sarawak's oldest political party, suffered the most casualties in the state elections last year, losing eight seats six to DAP, one to Snap and one to PKR. In the 2004 parliamentary election, it lost Bandar Kuching to DAP.

DAP remains the greatest threat to Supp in the state's Chinese majority areas.

Factional problems

Trouble is also brewing within Supp, with one faction led by the party president and the other by the Sibu branch chairperson and state Second Finance Minister Wong Soon Koh.

Although there are indications that the two factions may have set aside their differences over the choice of candidates for the next elections, the problems between them are believed to be far from over.

The Sibu group is demanding the sacking of the Dudong branch chairperson Dr Soon Choon Teck, a state assistant minister, for defying the party's directive on the setting up of the Dudong branch.

A central working committee (CWC) meeting on Thursday evening will discuss a letter from the Sibu branch on the action that it recommends to be taken against Soon, who is said to be aligned to the party president's group.

At Monday's meeting in Miri, Chan was also said to have asked the prime minister whether the federal government's financial allocations for Chinese schools in the country had been reduced.

To this, Abdullah told Chan, "on the contrary, the government had increased such financial allocations."

He said they should approach Education Minister Hishammuddin Hussein if they wanted to apply for financial allocations for Chinese schools.

Deputy Minister of Local Government and Housing Robert Lau Hoi Chiew while supporting his party president's comments also asked about financial allocations for mission schools, and the prime minister also gave the same reply.

The sources added that the prime minister also told the meeting that elections could be held in a year's time.