Speech Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Petaling, Lim Kit Siang, at the official opening of the Rasa DAP Branch and the Rasa DAP Branch Dinner at Rasa New Village on Sunday, 22nd Feb. 1981 at 7 pm
DAP to contest about 8 seats in the Sabah State General Election
The DAP will contest about 8 seats in the Sabah State General Election. This will be another opportunity for the DAP to seek to widen and deepen Malaysian support throughout the country for the long-term, national political struggle for a Malaysian Malaysia, where every Malaysian citizen, regardless of race, language, culture or religion, whether in Sabah, Sarawak or Peninsular Malaysia, will enjoy equal citizenship rights as a Malaysia.
In the 1979 Sarawak State General Elections, the DAP has made a major breakthrough in the State, and although the DAP did not win a single seat, the DAP in Sarawak general election was a great success in terms of the foundation we have laid for the DAP’s political future in Sarawak.
The DAP is aware that we will face great odds in Sabah, as the politics of money would be unleashed. In Peninsular Malaysia, the political of money talks in terms of 100 acres or 1,000 acres of land, but in Sabah, the politics of money talk in terms of square miles of timber concession.
The Berjaya Government of Sabah came to power on the platform of democracy, a clean and honest government, protection of the interests of people of Sabah from in particular the Pilipino refugees.
All these election promises of Parti Berjaya have been betrayed. In banning me and Sdr. Lee Lam Thye from entering Sabah, Parti Berjaya and
Datuk Harris Salleh have shown their true colours. Datuk Harris Salleh claimed that both of us were banned from entry into Sabah for our own security interest – when in actual fact, Datuk Harris Salleh is afraid of the political challenge that the DAP would pose with Lam Thye and my presence.
Datuk Harris Salleh has shown in his years of Sabah Chief Minister that he is no democrat. Nor has his government distinguished itself in the field of creating a honest, incorrupt government.
Corruption in Sabah, and in particular political corruption, has become a way of life, as illustrated by the infamous Berjaya A-B-C system, where
Berjaya leaders shared among themselves timber concessions of the state and people.
Parti Berjaya, under Tun Fuad in 1976, campaigned on the promise to end influx of Filipino refugees, and to repatriate them to their homeland.
Datuk Harris Salleh has done the opposite. He not only has failed to repatriate the Filipino refugees, he had become a party to the continued influx of more Filipino refugees, creating grave law and order problems for the people of Sabah.
On basic issues affecting the long-term future of the people of Sabah and Malaysia, Datuk Harris Salleh and Berjaya Government have failed to honour the Berjaya election pledges of 1976.
I would suggest that the Berjaya leaders re-read the 1976 election pledges and ask how many of them have been fulfilled – for instance, in the provision of adequate and regular Chinese and Kadazan television programme.
I call on the voters of Sabah to support DAP candidates to enable the Malaysian Malaysia movement take on greater power to change Malaysian society in the 1980s.