DAP is said to be “on the verge” of giving up its allocated parliamentary seats of Lawas and Mukah for the next general election.

Both seats are strongholds of Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB), the lead party in the four-party state Barisan Nasional coalition.

“DAP will give the seats to PKR to contest as it can’t find suitable candidates to take on PBB in those areas,” a Pakatan Harapan source told The Malaysian Insight.

The source said PKR had tried to press PH to announce the “handover” of the seats at today’s post-meeting media conference in Kuching, but state PH chairman Chong Chieng Jen reportedly asked that it be delayed “in the hope they can find suitable candidates”.

Asked about the status of the two seats, Chong only said PH “will go by the 2013 arrangement, with some adjustments along the way”.

There are 31 parliamentary seats in Sarawak.

In the 2013 seat allocation, DAP was given 11 seats and won five, while PKR was given the lion’s share of 15 seats, only to win just one. Then coalition partner PAS was allocated five seats, but won nothing.

PAS was then booted out from the now defunct Pakatan Rakyat bloc over its stand on hudud.

The former tourism minister in then prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s administration, Muhammad Leo Michael Toyad Abdullah, has represented Mukah since 1982.

In the 2013 election, DAP fielded Bonaventure Hai Merawin, a local Melanau, to unseat Toyad.

In the three-cornered contest, Toyad garnered more than 14,000 votes, compared with Merawin’s 2,219 and independent candidate Sylvester Ajah Subah, who got a similar number of votes as Merawin.

In the same year, DAP fielded dentist Dr Bob Baru Langub in Lawas, and the 3, 898 votes he got were not enough to unseat incumbent Henry Sum Agong, the deputy minister of domestic trade, cooperatives and consumerism.

Sum has held the seat since its creation in 2008.

PKR contested the seat in the 2008 election, but its candidate, Japar Suyut, polled a mere 734 votes to Sum’s 8,526.

Despite dithering over the two seats, Chong said PH had “identified 10 seats” it was confident of winning, with an “additional two or three more”.

Under the old Pakatan Rakyat coalition, DAP and PKR swept all of the state’s six urban seats – Bandar Kuching, Stampin, Lanang, Sibu, Sarikei and Miri – while BN held sway over predominantly Dayak and Malay rural seats.

Chong said PH’s assessment was based on feedback on the ground, which was mostly linked to the people’s economic well-being.

“The people are suffering under BN’s economic policies. The high cost of living and economic issues are getting from bad to worse.

“They’re making life harder for the people.”

Chong said PH candidates for GE14, which he said could be held in May, were “almost 100%” decided.

On the Miri seat, which DAP has launched a drive for, Chong reiterated that it would be contested by PKR. – December 9, 2017.