KOTA KINABALU: Former PKR Sabah leader Datuk Jelani Hamdan has reiterated that he had met with PBRS president Tan Sri Joseph Kurup.
The Matunggong assemblyman said that they met three times and PBRS Youth chief Arthur Kurup was present during two of the meetings.
Jelani said this in response to Arthur’s claim that there had never been any meetings between Jelani and PBRS leaders.
“I have met with Tan Sri Joseph Kurup three times and Arthur was present at the meetings in Cherry and Sutera Habour respectively. Arthur cannot deny this because I am stating the facts.
“I am a lawyer and I know what I am saying … I do not want to speculate,” he said, adding that he does not want to drag the issue as PBRS is a Barisan Nasional (BN) component party and he (Jelani) was a BN supporter.
Jelani also refuted claims that there were no invitations from PBRS for him to join the party as he can prove it through the many SMSes he received.
Jelani was one of the two Sabah PKR assemblymen who quit the party to become independent assemblymen. The other was Kadamaian representative Jeremy Malajad.
They were later joined by 11 leaders of the party’s 25 divisions from Kudat, Kota Marudu, Kota Belud, Sepanggar, Pensiangan, Beluran, Kinabatangan, Batu Sapi, Silam, Kalabakan and Semporna who said that they had lost faith in their national leadership.
Jelani, Jeremy and the 11 division leaders also pledged to support Barisan Nasional after meeting with the ruling coalition chairman Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak in Kuala Lumpur.
Jelani said the group decided to quit because certain PKR leaders had failed to fulfil their pledge to give the state grassroots leaders autonomy in deciding on certain matters.
He denied the group had been bought over, saying there was no reason for Barisan to do so as it already commanded a two-thirds majority in the state assembly.