BELURAN: Bersatu Vice President Datuk Seri Dr Ronald Kiandee, who is defending the Beluran parliamentary seat in the 15th General Election (GE15) under the Perikatan Nasional (PN) ticket, claimed he is not an opposition candidate.
Ronald said PN was part of the Sabah Government, adding that during the 16th Sabah State election in 2020, the candidates who have joined the Sate Government today have also used the PN logo.
“Component parties under Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS), except for PBS (Parti Bersatu Sabah) and Usno (United Sabah National Organisation), are also PN component parties,” he said, adding that it should not be an issue at all.
He said this during a get-together session at Kampung Muanad 3, here, Monday.
GRS, which consists of Bersatu, PBS, Parti Solidariti Tanah Airku (Star), Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) and Usno, is cooperating with Barisan Nasional (BN) to rule the State. However, Bersatu, Star and SAPP, together with PAS and Gerakan, are component parties forming the PN coalition.
The Agriculture and Food Industries Minister said PN is the right platform for elected leaders to continue to raise the aspirations of the Beluran community at the national level.
Ronald said as part of his big agenda, he wanted to ensure continuous development in Beluran and highlight the lack of infrastructure in the rural area.
Describing the five-cornered clash in the Beluran seat as a “friendly fight”, Ronald said the Sabah people had experienced a similar situation in the previous state election, adding all parties should be mature and accept the matter.
Ronald is facing Benedict Asmat (BN-Umno), Rowiena Rasid (Parti Warisan), Hausing Samsudin @ Sudin (Pejuang) and Felix Joseph Saang (The United Progressive Kinabalu Organisation [Upko]-Pakatan Harapan).
Meanwhile, Datuk Seri Bung Moktar Radin said the battle to get back the Beluran seat is a personal matter for Sabah Umno.
“It is personal for Sabah Umno, we will fight tooth and nail to win back our traditional seat,” the Sabah Barisan Chief said.
Bung ordered the party machinery to go all out to topple Kiandee, Perikatan Nasional’s lone candidate, who broke the GRS-BN seat-sharing pact that had allocated Beluran seat to BN.
“Kiandee is a five-term Beluran MP. He won the seat all the time under Barisan. Now, we will bring him down with the same logo (Barisan),” Bung said.
He said Beluran was a unique and traditional Umno seat because it was the first and only Umno seat that was represented by a non-Muslim MP from Umno since 1995.
He said Barisan was keeping with the tradition of fielding a non-Muslim and local native Benedict Asmat, the former Sandakan Municipal Council President, for the north-eastern Sabah seat which had a mixed population of Kadazandusuns, Tidong and Sungai natives.
Bung said it was time for Kiandee’s five terms to come to an end as he had not brought much development for the area despite being an MP and also a federal Minister.
“Whatever progress brought to Beluran was because of local Assemblyman Datuk James Ratib who has been with the people on the ground all this while,” he said.
Bung’s push for an all out war against Kiandee comes after Kiandee slammed Barisan for allegedly stealing the seat from GRS platform.
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