Milton Foo
KUCHING (Nov 8): Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP)’s Milton Foo is ready to take on the challenge of contesting in Pending in the 12th state election, having moved on from his failed attempt in the 2016 polls.
Being amongst Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS)’s key potential candidates for the urban seat, the 44-year-old practising lawyer said he had never stopped serving the constituents since the 2016 election, and the feedback from the ground had been positive so far.
In the May 7 state election of 2016, Foo lost to Democratic Action Party (DAP)’s Violet Yong, who retained the seat with a comfortable 5,012-majority.
She garnered 12,454 votes, while Foo polled 7,442.
“The reason why I haven’t stopped serving (Pending constituents) since 2016 is because I owe it to those supporters who had voted for me, who came out to contest for the first time then.
“I’m indebted to them. I told myself that I would make it my best endeavour to assist in resolving the problems encountered by them as far as I could, through whatsoever limited resources that I had, even though most of the time, I couldn’t due to not having government’s allocations, especially when it came to infrastructure and schools,” he told The Borneo Post here.
According to Foo, the other GPS potential candidate for Pending is Kho Teck Wan, currently a Kuching South City councillor, and also SUPP Women chief.
Adding on, he said based on sentiments on the ground, he could put up a good fight against Yong in the coming election.
Foo said the majority of Pending constituents, especially those in Bintawa and Sungai Apong, said they had lost faith in the DAP lawmaker, who was first elected into the State Legislative Assembly (DUN) in 2006 and was later re-elected in 2011 and 2016.
“Some constituents in Pending have channelled their complaints about Yong directly to me; there’s also hearsay information about people losing faith in her.”
Asked how confident he was in being re-nominated as a candidate for Pending, Foo said: “As far as I’m concerned, I leave it to the party (SUPP) and the Chief Minister’s wisdom to make the final call.
“I always believe that preparations for the election should not only start now, like many other politicians who would only emerge or ‘turun padang’ (go to the ground) when polling day is around the corner.
“Politics is not a mere show, we need someone who really cares and knows the root cause of the problems in the constituency,” he said, listing illegal squatters, land title issues, lack of infrastructure such as streetlights and ditches, as some of the problems faced by constituents in Pending.
“There are schools in the Pending constituency that are in need of funds for maintenance, repair and upgrading purposes,” added Foo.
Attempts to obtain comments from Kho had not been successful.