Sarawak PKR chairman Baru Bian said he expects a tough fight to defend his Ba' Kelalan seat in the coming state election, as Barisan Nasional prepares to field "high standing" candidates against him.
Baru, who won the seat by defeating his nephew Willie Leow by a slim margin of 473 votes in a straight fight in the 2011 election, said he was unfazed by what BN planned to throw at him. Baru had polled 2,505 votes to Leow's 2,032 votes to become only one of three successful PKR candidates in the election.
"Now my friends are telling me, 'you are in danger'," said Baru. "But there are lots of factors to consider who wins or loses in this constituency made up largely of conservative Christians." He added that the candidate's personality and standing in the community were the most important. "Personality matters especially among Orang Ulus.
The BN tagline alone is not good enough," he said. "People here couldn't care less about your politics or who you're affiliated with. "The character of who represents them matters most. "To be a leader of the community, in whatever capacity even as a church elder, you must have an impeccable personality. "Those who drink and smoke publicly have little hope of winning votes. "That's religious decadence to them and its a big taboo. If you are a leader and if you drink and smoke, you will be deemed untrustworthy and they will tell you straight in your face, that you cannot be trusted," he said.
Prior to the 2011 election, the incumbent of the seat was the secretary-general of Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP), a BN-component party. Datuk Nelson Balan Rining was dropped from the BN line-up at the eleventh hour and Leow was thrown in. Baru being a church elder had put him in good stead. The disarray in the BN camp also helped. Having learnt their lessons, Baru said the fight for his Ba' Kelalan seat would be tough.
SPDP has reportedly shortlisted five names to contest the seat. All five are said to be "men of standing" in the community, who "do not smoke or drink" and are of the same age or older than Baru. "I am being told that they had even tried to rope in a church elder as a potential candidate." "I foresee a tough fight and I expect that," he said amid talk that former MP Mutang Tagal was the BN candidate.
Mutang is from the highly respected Tagal family of Buduk Nur. His younger brother, Datuk Dr Judson Tagal who died in a helicopter crash in Lawas on July 12, 2004, was a former assemblyman of the constituency. "After all, I am the PKR chief chief in the state and BN would muster all their resources to unseat me like what they did in the last election," said Baru. "They would probably pour in a lot of money and bring in all the big guns to Ba' Kelalan.
"I am a very ordinary person. I have been telling the people that if you appreciate what I have been doing and what I have been standing for, you vote for me. "If you don't, it's OK with me." Baru said if he failed to be re-elected, he would take up farming in Brunut, his ancestral village. – February 2, 2016. -The Malaysian Insider.
Post a Comment