After openly objecting to the inclusion of PAS in the new Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) government, Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) and Parti Solidariti Tanah Airku (STAR) should now pull out of the alliance, said a Sabah DAP leader.
Sabah DAP Wanita chief Jannie Lasimbang has urged PBS and STAR to pull out of the Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) state government after a PAS member became one of the six nominated assemblymen today.
The Kapayan assemblyman said STAR and PBS supporters would not have agreed with having a PAS man appointed to the state assembly, adding that the parties’ presidents had given assurances this would not happen.
“Both PBS president Datuk Seri Maximus Ongkili and STAR president Datuk Seri Jeffrey Gapari Kitingan have vehemently denied that this would happen.
“Supporters of both STAR and PBS would not have agreed to allowing PAS, an Islamist party, to be a member of the DUN just as so many members of the public, institutions, NGOs and political leaders have expressed in the last few days. An online petition to not allow PAS in the DUN has already received more than 18,000 signatures in less than a week,” she said in a statement.
Lasimbang also expressed disappointment in the lack of women nominated to the state assembly and slammed GRS for only appointing the coalition’s two female assemblymen as assistant ministers in the same ministry.
“This not only shows that GRS has no faith in the abilities of its female assemblymen but also indicates stereotyping by putting them both in the ministry of community development and people’s well-being,” she said.
Meanwhile, PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang expressed appreciation to Chief Minister Hajiji Noor for the appointment of its state secretary, Aliakbar Gulasan, as a nominated assemblyman.
Hadi described the appointment of a PAS member to the state assembly, for the first time, as the start of a new era for the party. He also thanked Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin for making the appointment possible.
The five other appointed reps are former chief minister Yong Teck Lee, Umno’s Suhaimi Nasir and Raimie Unggi, and Bersatu’s Jaffari Walliam and Amisah Yassin.