UPP still open to merger with SPDP

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Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh

Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh

KUCHING: The United People’s Party (UPP) has welcomed Sarawak Progressive Democratic party (SPDP)’s offer for a merger and the party is expecting to deliberate on the matter at its upcoming central committee (CC) meeting in November.

UPP president Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh told The Borneo Post yesterday that the party maintained an open stance on the proposed merger with SPDP.

“We are open though SPDP’s no-condition term is actually a condition on its own. Despite so, we have referred the matter to our central committee for discussion and deliberations,” said Wong, who is the Second Finance Minister.

He was responding to the recent rumours of ‘serious talks’ between some leaders on the merger of the two political parties.

According to sources, senior leaders from both parties had held earnest talks to look into the possibility of merger in the future.

“Though there are differences to be ironed out, we would like to see something concrete happening between our two parties. Basically, there is no inherent problem for the two parties to merge. We are both BN (Barisan Nasional) supporters.

“In terms of ideology, we have no problems. The problems that we have are technical ones involving details that may take some time to come to a consensus,” said the source, pointing out that talks between the two parties had been on-going despite facing hurdles along the way.

“However, both sides are showing sincerity to achieve some kind of consensus by not giving up. We are very confident that finally, something concrete would come about,” said the source.

Less than a week after the May 7 state election, SPDP openly invited UPP to discuss the possibility of a merger.

The decision was unanimously agreed at SPDP’s emergency supreme council held in Kuching on May 10.

SPDP president Datuk Seri Tiong King Sing disclosed after the meeting that the supreme council attended by 28 supreme council members also extended its invitation to Parti Tenaga Rakyat Sarawak (Teras).