KOTA KINABALU – In the run up to the 1990 election, Chief Minister (CM) Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan, would court the political wrath of then Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.
Pairin had withdrawn PBS from Barisan Nasional (BN) and threw its support behind Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, who left Umno due to the Team A–Team B feud to form Semangat 46 (S46).
On the outset this was seen as the manoeuvre that paved the way for the entry of non-Bornean parties to colour Sabah’s political landscape, starting with Umno and MCA, but those in the know believe that Umno’s influence crept in even before Double Six.
“Umno’s presence in Sabah can be traced as far as 1967 – four years after Malaysia was formed. Back when Syed Kechik was made the first director of Yayasan Sabah,” said historian Dr Bilcher Bala of Universiti Malaysia Sabah.
To the unfamiliar, Tan Sri Syed Kechik Syed Mohamed Al-Bukhary was the political aide of Malaysia’s first Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, who was also the second president of Umno.
Usno was eventually dissolved in 1991 to make way for Umno and former CM Tun Mustapha Harun was made the party’s Sabah liaison chief and appointed as a federal minister for Sabah affairs in 1992.
And in the 1994 state election, BN led by Umno’s Tun Sakaran Dandai – who is also the uncle to the current caretaker CM Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal – ultimately ended up forming the government, despite losing the election, following massive defections from PBS.
“Umno Sabah’s first member was Tun Mustapha. The founding leader of Sabah. The man who was still revered by Sabahans. It was his aura that helped negate much of the anti-Peninsular rhetoric of Pairin during that election,” Bilcher remarked.
By the time of Pairin’s resignation as CM, PBS lost 20 of the 25 state seats that it won. The outcome was so controversial to the point that the act of jumping ship received an unfavourable view among Malaysians, and those doing it were called “katak” (frogs).
“The final blow to Pairin came when his younger brother, Jeffrey Kitingan, announced that he was leaving PBS to form Parti Demokratik Sabah Bersatu that would ultimately seek to join BN,” said Professor James Chin, of the University of California Press.
The end of a system and the fall of an empire
Unlike other states, Sabah used to have a rotation system that alternated its CM post between the Muslim, non-Muslim bumiputra and the Chinese communities every two years. It was one of BN’s sales pitches during the 1994 state election.
However, in 2004 the system was scrapped by Dr Mahathir’s successor, Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.
“Politically, the rotation system was implemented to maintain power but Umno eventually became too strong, too powerful to the point that it can rule Sabah on its own if need be,” said Bilcher.
And the ridding of the system had further strengthened the then CM, Tan Sri Musa Aman and Umno’s clout to the point of eventually becoming the most powerful political entities in Sabah, ruling over the state for 15 years from 2003 to 2018.
While Musa’s hold on Sabah was exceptionally strong in the 2004 and 2008 state elections, where BN, consecutively won 59 of 60 state seats, the coalition suffered its first setback in the 2013 election.
BN lost nine seats to the newly formed Pakatan Rakyat pact, which was led in Sabah by Datuk Seri Lajim Ukin, a former BN minister of Umno who also had a prior stint in PBS.
But the biggest blow to Musa’s stranglehold over Sabah happened on May 9, two years ago.
Unlike in the Peninsular, the ‘Anything but BN’ tsunami was not powerful enough to completely submerge Musa, but it did however bring about a hung assembly and a controversial episode of horse-trading in which Shafie emerged victorious.
A stormy election looms
Come September 26, Sabahans will repeat what they did two years ago – vote in a new government.
However this time, political fatigue seems very palpable, especially so against the backdrop of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic that has crippled much of the world.
And unlike last time, the jury is still out on who exactly has the real upper hand.
“Umno is split into three camps, Warisan did not deliver what it promised and the small fries don’t even stand a chance on their own,” a political observer said.
What an ironic twist for Sabah, the land below the wind. – The Vibes, September 22, 2020
Part One: The tragedy that rocked Sabah and the shake-ups that ensued
