STRENGTHENING Warisan should be the party’s main focus before entering into alliances with other parties, president Mohd Shafie Apdal said.

He said this was important to ensure that Warisan was not seen as a ‘crony’ of any party, or merely to help strengthen other parties in the cooperation, and instead, a party that was rooted in its fight for the interests of Sabah and the country as a whole.

“We want to build our house first. The walls, pillars and roof are all there, (but) sometimes even our pillars are stolen, this is the reality.

“As party leaders, we have to make sure our party is strong enough, I can’t talk about co-operation with many parties without first having a strong party.

“I’m not saying anything negative, I always keep the door open, but I want to build my party first. If we don’t build and strengthen the party, we may face pressure during co-operation later.

“I say this from experience,” he said during a press conference at the Warisan headquarters in Kolombong, Kota Kinabalu, today.

Shafie said co-operation between political parties should be done especially when one party becomes the government in a state and the other forms the federal government, but it must be based on smart co-operation.

“For example, if we form the government in Sabah we must co-operate with the peninsula because we are in one country, but we must be smart to ‘detail’ the form of co-operation and on who we want it with, we do not want to move on our own, but we have to make careful observations first,” he said. – Bernama, May 12, 2022.