WITH opposition parties in Sarawak unable to forge electoral cooperation for the state elections next month, very few, if any, of the 82 legislative assembly seats will see a straight fight.

A record number of candidates are expected to be fielded and Pakatan Harapan (PH) will not get a chance to directly take on the ruling Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS).

Pro-independence Parti Bumi Kenyalang (PBK), registered in 2013, is making its electoral debut in the elections.

Last month PBK announced 15 candidates as well as plans to contest in all of Kuching’s non-Malay majority seats – Padungan, Pending, Batu Lintang, Kota Sentosa, Batu Kitang, and Batu Kawah.

PBK has refused to work with peninsula-affiliated opposition parties and failed to find any local partners with similar ideological goals.

Multi-cornered contests are expected in all seats, and this will favour the incumbents or candidates of the ruling party, said political observer James Chin, professor of Asian Studies at the University of Tasmania.

In the case of marginal seats, votes will be split for the opposition, enabling GPS candidates to sneak in on a minority majority, he said.

Two other state-based opposition parties, Parti Sarawak Bersatu (PSB) and the small coalition of Gasak, are expected to field candidates in many of the urban seats, making the fight for urban votes a crowded one.

Independent candidates are also expected to join the fray.

Urban seats

Sarawak PKR recently accused its ally DAP of refusing to negotiate over seat allocations in an open and transparent manner. DAP denied this.

DAP will have to face a PBK candidate in seven urban seats in Kuching – Padungan, Pending, Batu Lintang, Kota Sentosa, Batu Kitang, Batu Kawah, and Stakan.

In the last state elections in 2016, Pending, Kota Sentosa, and Stakan saw straight fights between DAP-PH and Sarawak Barisan Nasional while Padungan, Batu Lintang, and Batu Kawah saw three-way contests.  It was a five-way contest in Batu Kitang with PH partners PKR and DAP tripping over one another for the seat.

In Pending DAP’s Violet Yong easily defeated her SUPP-BN opponent Milton Foo by 5,012 votes to keep the seat for a third term.

In the December 18 elections, Yong could be facing at least three opponents: PBK’s Teo Kuang Kim and yet-to- be-named candidates from SUPP and PSB. There is also the likelihood of Independent candidates getting into the ring.

Sarawak DAP chairman Chong Chieng Jen will face multi-cornered fights defending Kota Sentosa. PBK has named the unknown Lue Cheng Hing as a contender to unseat the three-term assemblyman.

Batu Lintang

PBK’s Voon Lee Shan has named himself the candidate for Batu Lintang, the seat he represented from 2006 to 2011, when he was with DAP.

Voon is likely to face his successor and the incumbent, See Chee How, formerly of PKR but now at PSB.

See was one of three Sarawak assemblymen who were sacked from PKR following a power struggle in February last year that triggered a national political crisis and the collapse of the PH federal government.

GPS, via its coalition partner SUPP, will field a candidate in this mixed constituency that had 28,105 voters in the 2016 rolls.

The elections that year was a three-way fight for the seat. See polled 10,758 votes, SUPP’s Sih Hua Tong, 6,373, and STAR’s Lina Soo, 331.

Padungan

The Chinese-majority seat of Padungan, which also saw a three-way contest in the 2016 elections, could see a repeat scenario but with new faces.

The incumbent, DAP’s Wong King Wei who won comfortably with a 4,270-vote majority, will not be defending the seat he won twice.

Wong dumped the party after falling out with the Sarawak DAP chairman Chong. DAP has yet to name a candidate for the seat.

PBK, meanwhile, has named its political affairs director, Raymond Thong as its candidate for Padungan. It will be Thong’s first election.

Ruling coalition party SUPP’s candidate will only be known when GPS unveils its lineup.

Sarawak People’s Aspiration Party president Lina Soo could make the Padungan contest at least a five-way fight.

Soo stood in Batu Lintang in the last elections where she fared miserably and even lost her deposit.

PBK goes for rural and coastal seats

PBK on November 17 named candidates for the eight rural and coastal seats of Sebuyau, Lingga, Beting Maro, Balai Ringin, Bukit Begunan, Simanggang, Engkilili, and Batang Ai.

Yesterday, it named 16 for constituencies in the southern part of Sarawak: Satok, Asajaya, Muara Tuang, Stakan, Serembu, Mambong, Tarat, Tebedu, Kedup, Bukit Semuja, Sadong Jaya, Gedong, Sebuyau, Lingga, Saribas, and Kabong.

This killed any lingering hopes PH might have harbourd for a straight fight in these largely Malay- and Dayak-majority seats.

The Dayak-majority seats of Bukit Begunan and Batang Ai saw a straight fight in the last elections. – November 30, 2021.