Kalabakan member of parliament Datuk Seri Ghapur Salleh,
who said he does not want to see ‘candidate saboteurs’ get recognition, has
urged the Barisan Nasional (BN) leadership and Umno to be more vigilant in
addressing such issue in the next election.
Referring to past
cases, Ghapur said the situation seemed to show that ‘the candidate’ and ‘the
sponsor’ were rewarded as recognition for their action in the 12th general
election when by right BN should be more wary of such individuals.
“What was surprising,
once the election ended, both of them were given honorary titles, and at least
one was offered a high position in a BN component party,” he said on Tuesday.
He said the situation
occurred in Kalabakan during the last general election.
“At that time, an
independent candidate contesting was sponsored by a former BN leader and we had
to work hard to ensure the BN candidate won. Thankfully, our efforts were
successful,” he said.
“We voice this matter
out because we do not want things that had happened before happen again in the
next election. We do not want an ‘insider’ to sabotage candidates selected by
BN,” he said.
“As chairman of Umno
and Kalabkan BN, I see this an important issue because we want to see BN win
big in the next election,” he said.
Ghapur said he had
taken the matter up in a meeting with Umno disciplinary committee in Kota
Kinabalu last month and he hoped it would be given due attention.
Source: The BorneoPost July 5, 2012