Harris Turns Tables On Pairin Over Bullying Claim

Now this looks interesting! Harris Salleh, Sabah Former Chief Minister, has lashed back at Joseph Pairin Kitingan over the bullying claim. Harris has always been known to be one of Dr Mahathir Mohamed's staunchest allies. So it is only natural that Harris would defend Dr M.

However, PBS might rebut Harris' statement with the 1984 By-election where Pairin won his Tambunan constituency as an Independent candidate. After the win, the Berjaya government decided to 'bully' Tambunan by cutting it off from the State Government's development plan. This is to show the Tambunan constituents the importance of voting a government candidate. The scheme backfired and cost Berjaya the State Government when PBS won the General Election of 1985.

All of these events happened because of the word "bully". We'll see how PBS will respond to this in tomorrow's news.

  

Daily Express

Wednesday, 22nd October 2008

Kota Kinabalu: Former Chief Minister Datuk Harris Salleh said it was Datuk Seri Joseph Pairin Kitingan And Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) that bullied former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed as well the people of Sabah when it was running the State Government.

"Not only it is not true, but it is also irresponsible and vexatious," he said in refuting Pairin's earlier remark that PBS was bullied by Dr Mahathir's UMNO-led Barisan Nasional.

Pairin's remark on Monday about bullying by Dr Mahathir was in response to a statement by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi that UMNO never bullied its Barisan Nasional partners.

Harris said in his statement, Tuesday, that one instance of bullying by PBS was when it pulled out of the ruling coalition just a few weeks before the General Election in 1990.

"It was through its connection on the Mamut Copper Mine, that it formed a pact with Gerakan to pull out of the BN. However, Gerakan chickened out at the last minute.

"Pairin became desperate to get back into BN and lobbied a few prominent people, including the late Tan Sri Wee Boon Ping, who managed to persuade Dr Mahathir to bring PBS eventually back into the Barisan," he claimed. Harris said another time when Pairin acted like a bully when he ignored the commitment and contract signed between the Berjaya Government and 60,000 smallholders."

He claimed that Pairin had insisted then that it (the contract) "was not binding because there was in fact no land available and that the Berjaya Government was simply bluffing the  smallholders."

He said what the PBS Government then did was to alienate most of the 906,300 acres reserved by the Berjaya Government to cronies and the PBS government supporters who then sold these lands to peninsula companies.

Harris further claimed that as a result, more than 90 percent of these lands in Sabah today are now owned by peninsula companies and that Tan Sri Joseph Kurup's statements in the Land Office would confirm this.

He also accused Pairin and PBS leaders of having "perfected the art of twisting facts", as well as the Labuan issue. "The so-called privatisation of government properties, the alienation of land reserved by developers for car parks, children's playgrounds in the City and town areas of Sabah were mostly alienated by PBS to its supporters and cronies.

"PBS bullied the people of Sabah into electing it again and again," he said, and lamented also the actions and decisions of the Federal leadership, including Dr Mahathir, would prefer and want people to be in their win-win club.

"You win we will be with you. You lose, bye-bye. These have been the established attitude and practice until these days by the UMNO leadership," he said.

Harris added that favouritism in awarding negotiated contracts is a big factor. He said any leader of the component parties could argue and challenge the BN leadership to put things right.

"However, since most of the component party leaders are obliged to curry favour and give support because of expected favours, the moral question of right or wrong is normally and usually thrown overboard."

Harris said his statement were based on facts and was prepared to have a public debate with any leaders, especially Pairin and the PBS leaders, on the subject of bullies, wrongdoings, ICs and so on.

Mahathir Bullied PBS: Pairin

Hmmm. The Kadazandusun Paramount Leader finally made a stand. To me, he has been very quiet in the recent issues of illegal immigrants and Mykad ownerships. So now he has made a stand. But it is a personal stand against former premier Dr Mahathir Mohamed. To me, its a sign of desperation. PBS' return to BN occurred during the twilight of the Mahathir-era. It is a known fact that the 2 resented each other since the 1990 PBS pullout from the Barisan Nasional. Since the Prime Minister's announcement of not defending the UMNO presidency, everybody is re-positioning themselves in the political landscape. The air is hot that Dr Mahathir will make a return to the national scene once Najib Razak's position as Prime Minister is secured. He could even be a 'minister mentor' in the new cabinet. So, if Dr M is back in power, then Pairin will have to find other avenues fast in order not to be swallowed alive in the 'cleansing' process that is certainly to be followed. My money will be on PBS' pullout next year. Daily Express Kota Kinabalu: Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) said it was bullied by the Umno-led Barisan Nasional (BN) when Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed was Prime Minister. Its President Datuk Seri Joseph Pairin Kitingan said after attending the Rural Development Ministry Hari Raya open house in Sembulan, Monday. "If I were to look back, during the time of Dr Mahathir, of course we were bullied." He said the over the years, there have a number of cases where people have raised the issue of a BN component bullying its partners. However, he said the most important is to sit down and discuss the issue in a roundtable meeting in the spirit of the BN. He also said that Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi had commented on the issue recently. Abdullah said that Umno had never bullied its partners in the BN and blamed the opposition parties for coming up with such an accusation to deny the people's support for the ruling coalition. He said that if Umno had bullied its partners, other component parties would have left the BN a long time ago. PBS left the BN in 1990 and rejoined the coalition a decade later. Meanwhile, Pairin said MCA was only thinking of itself when it proposed two deputy chairman posts in Barisan Nasional (BN) with one of them filled by an MCA leader. He said since the issue was brought up in the open, it meant that the MCA is using the subject as a political tool. While the proposal is not an urgent issue, he felt other parties might demand similar recognition should the extra BN deputy chairman post be created. "If you create an extra (post), why not another oneÉwhat about Sabah and Sarawak," he said. He was asked to comment on a statement by former MCA Youth chief, Datuk Liow Tiong Lai at the MCA Youth delegates conference in Kuala Lumpur recently. Liow had said that the extra post is necessary to reflect the position, importance and representation of all the component parties. Pairin, who is Deputy Chief Minister cum Rural Development Minister, however said in the 50 years the BN has been operating, the system of one Chairman and one Deputy Chairman has been working very well. Nevertheless, he said that such suggestion should be presented in a more formal manner through a working paper for consideration and discussion within the BN roundtable meeting. However, he stressed that more pressing and important issues such as the implementation of various promises to complete unfinished development programmes should be given more priority. "We all ought to try and be level-headed and to ensure that we do not bring ourselves and the country into a situation where we would find ourselves in difficulty to cope," he said. He said that political parties which intend to be champions for the people would only make things worse if they terlanjur kata (go overboard in their statement). "In the BN spirit, we all ought to sit down together and talk in a roundtableÉthis is a very sensible way. "We must not fall into the trap of getting our emotion all worked up to the extent that we cannot think rationally," he said. Pairin said that in all they do, they must think in the context of what is good for the country in general. He expressed hope that political leaders would help bring about a more sober situation to that the family spirit of the BN could be maintained. Personally, he said that irrespective of whether an extra post for deputy chairman is created, the most important is power sharing. "It's all a question of equitable sharing, fairness and justice and feeling of a win-win situation," he said. He said by establishing another post, the government would have to fork out extra money when they are supposed to be prudent during the economically challenging period. Also present were his assistant ministers Datuk Sairin Karno and Datuk Ghulam Haidar Khan Bahadar.