Daily Express

Kota Kinabalu: Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) President Datuk Seri Joseph Pairin Kitingan is wrong to say it is not the right time for political change, said his younger brother, Datuk Dr Jeffrey Kitingan, who is Parti Keadilan Rakyat Sabah deputy chief.

"The reality at the grassroots indicate otherwise with the people crying out for change. Even at the remotest villages, simple folk know they have not benefited through PBS since BN came into power," he said.

"A huge percentage of the electorate have already decided to vote for Keadilan in the next election," he claimed, adding that such sentiment could not be reversed by a simple offer of development projects under the Ninth Malaysia Plan.

Nonetheless, he said Keadilan saluted Pairin for his honesty in saying that PBS was aware that "its participation in the BN has yet to bear fruitful results".

"By this statement, he (Pairin) admits that PBS' readmission to the BN since January 2002 has been fruitless or in other words, has been in vain, and had not brought any benefit to the people.

"By asserting that PBS is still relevant, Pairin also actually cast strong doubt about the relevance of PBS in the present political scenario. How can it be relevant when after all these years it has not borne fruitful results?

"If after five years it failed to deliver, can it really hope to do it now and in the future when the BN is now so dominated by Umno, while PBS and the other components have little say in political decision-making?" he asked.

Dr Jeffrey said PBS must also look into how much role it will have in implementing the Ninth Malaysia Plan.

"It should speak out against corruption in the BN É there is so much injustice and unresolved problems in Sabah now such as the worsening illegal immigrant problem, corruption, unbalanced development distribution, native land issues, poverty," he said.