PBS OFFICIALLY NAMES THEM AS HAVING FORCED PAIRIN'S HAND IN BN PULLOUT

PBS officially names them as having forced Pairin's hand in BN pullout

March 23, 2011Kota Kinabalu: Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) Vice President Datuk Radin Malleh said PBS President Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan remained loyal to the Barisan Nasional although the Federal leadership at that time did not favour the party.

And for the first time, the party has officially put on record that it was three former high-ranking PBS leaders who forced Pairin's hand into making that fateful decision to pull out from the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition on the eve of the 1990 general elections.

The pullout decision announced at 8pm at the KK Community Centre, here, was what led Tun Dr Mahathir to convene an urgent Umno Supreme Council meeting at midnight the same day in Kuala Lumpur to make an even more important decision that would change Sabah's political landscape forever - Umno's historic expansion to Sabah.

"Until then, it had been our policy not to undermine the pro-BN indigenous parties in Sabah and Sarawak by starting Umno there.

"Now to counter the PBS defection, we had to assert our presence in Sabah to maintain the BN's position," Dr Mahathir said in his book.

"Although Pairin was already pushed to the wall, he remained loyal to BN until an emergency PBS Supreme Council meeting held on Oct. 15, 1990 where he was forced to agree to pull out from BN by Datuk Yong Teck Lee and Datuk Tham Nyip Shen, supported by Tan Sri Bernard Dompok.

"These three people were very adamant to get out from BN," said Radin, in a statement.

Commenting on Dr Mahathir's comment that Pairin lost the opportunity to develop Sabah the moment he decided to pull out from the Barisan Nasional just before the 1990 General Election, Radin said:

"The indifferent attitude and unfair treatment by the Federal leadership then towards Pairin created the whole problem in terms of development funds and projects."

Radin, who is also Melalap Assemblyman, said the Federal leadership then did not recognise the PBS Government as they could not accept the defeat of Berjaya.

This was obvious when Dr Mahathir said "he didn't know who is the Chief Minister" when Pairin was sworn-in as the legitimate Chief Minister while the late Tun Mustapha had been "illegally sworn-in as Chief Minister at a predawn event on April 23, 1985 immediately just after the state election," he said.

The Federal leadership, according to him, was too engrossed and as if being charmed by (ex-CM) Datuk Harris Salleh, as admitted by Dr Mahathir in that he was very close to the latter, as the former had said that "he would swim and sink" with Berjaya.

Radin said the Federal leadership did not even take any punitive action against those perpetrators in a demonstration on the streets in 1986.

When Dr Mahathir visited Sabah on Oct. 13, 1990, during the elections at the Padang Merdeka, here, he did not respond at all when Pairin in his speech requested for development funds to be channeled to Sabah so that projects including building a university could be implemented.

"Things should be put in their proper perspective if not for (now Tun) Musa Hitam, PBS would not have governed Sabah though it had won the elections with simple majority but had first past the post albeit a rough journey throughout," he said.