SPDP 5 loses faith in chief

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PROVING A POINT: Entrie (right) showing the media the status quo statement signed but was reneged by Mawan. Looking on is Nansian.

KUCHING: Group strongly feels Mawan unable to resolve the current crisis in party.

KUCHING: The conflict between Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP) president Tan Sri William Mawan Ikom and the so-called SPDP 5 seemed to have crossed the Rubicon.

The group, comprising senior vice president Datuk Peter Nansian Ngusie, vice presidents Datuk Sylvester Entri Muran, Datuk Dr Tiki Lafe and Rosey Yunus, and information chief Paulus Palu Gumbang yesterday declared that they had “no confidence and have lost faith” in Mawan to resolve the current conflict.

Only four of the members attended the press conference which was held at Nansian’s office at Juara Bertuah in MJC Batu Kawah.

Dr Tiki was absent because he had a function in Bau.

Nansian, who chaired the press conference, said they had called Dr Tiki and were given the blessing to carry on (with the announcement).

“Today (yesterday) is one of the saddest and most regrettable moments of our lives to have come to a point that we have to make a decision to declare that we have lost faith and confidence in our SPDP president.

“He is now apparently no longer able to resolve the current conflict in the party amicably and peacefully to maintain party unity and stability, and to protect and safeguard BN seats vested in the party for a continuously strong BN government for the good of the rakyat,” said Nansian, who read out a prepared statement.

The group said it strongly felt that if Mawan was serious in resolving the conflict, he should have formed a reconciliation committee or unity committee and not a disciplinary committee to take action against it recently.

Nansian revealed that they had met Mawan no less than three times formally as a group and more times on informal occasions over the last two years to smoke the peace pipe.

During these meetings, he said, both sides agreed on many points on how to reconcile and work together to maintain stability and make the party stronger.

“But he (Mawan) did not implement them accordingly. On the contrary, he had made many controversial remarks that create much uneasiness and suspicions within the party as well as between BN component parties.

“While we urged him to run the party with principle, consistency, fairness, and with sincerity to maintain party
unity and stability, we were labelled as the “Rebel 5” and “Group of 5”. So, who had actually started the friction and faction in the party?” Nansian asked.

He added that while they had always been supporting the president and telling him that they wanted him to be their strong leader, Mawan instead uttered many unkind and inconsistent remarks about them and other elected representatives in recent times.

“In the early years of SPDP, when the president worked well with us, the party was very united and stable. But now the party has become weaker, and we lost two BN seats (in the last state election),” he lamented.

Nansian also revealed that while they had agreed on consensus to have status quo in the last party election, Mawan did not keep his promise in the signed statement after the party election.

He, instead, changed a few appointed posts, including that of the secretary-general’s post.

No matter what would happened from this point onwards, Nansian said that the SPDP 5 would continue to give undivided support to the BN leadership at both state and federal levels.

MEETING THE PRESS: (From left) Paulus, Rosey, Nansian and Entrie at the press conference yesterday.

“We will give our full support to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and Chief Minister Pehin Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud as the national and state BN chairmen respectively. We will swim and sink with BN, under the wise leadership of these two leaders.

“At the same time, we will continue to serve the people in our respective constituencies in the name of Barisan Nasional, since we won the last state election with big majorities under the banner of BN,” he said.

Nansian stressed that they did not have any personal grudges against Mawan.

“We just couldn’t agree with his management of the party as it could undermine the strength of the BN and our ability to serve the rakyat well. We feel that these are of prime importance and must be safeguarded at all times. We put these above our own interest,” he said.

When asked by reporters later, Nansian said what they planned to do now was to look for “the best solution” to resolve the current situation and “we will cross the bridge when the time comes”.

On the show cause letter served on Entrie, he said it was now no longer relevant.

“Our action today (yesterday) tells everything, because when you touched one of us, you touched all of us as a group,” he said, obviously referring to the show cause letter served on Entrie.

He, however, asserted that the group would not quit the party, and reiterated that all they wanted was the “best solution to resolve the conflict”.

Meanwhile, political pundits believed that the declaration by the group of five had spelt the beginning of the end for SPDP, unless a “best solution” could be found.