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SABAH SURVEYS | The question of who will be Gabungan Rakyat Sabah’s (GRS) chief ministerial candidate remains up in the air even as Sabah’s election campaign is drawing to a close.
A touted chief minister candidate is Sabah Bersatu chief Hajiji Noor, 65, who is seeking an eighth term as a member of the Sulaman legislative assembly.
The other two candidates are the president of Warisan, Shafie Apdal, and the head of Sabah BN, Bung Moktar Radin.
While Shafie and Bung wield considerable influence in their respective strongholds of Semporna and Kinabatangan respectively, they have both spent most of their time crossing the state to search for their allies.
However, Hajiji’s campaign, based on the invitations sent to the media, appears to be limited to the Tuaran area.
Tuaran is a city that is an hour’s drive north of Kota Kinabalu. The Tuaran parliamentary constituency is where Sulaman is located.
Hajiji ventured to campaign outside of Tuaran for the first time on Tuesday afternoon, with several stops in Papar. In the evening, he was back in Tuaran for a conferences.
Read more: Sabah Decides 2020: Making sense of players, parties and battles
In Tuaran, Hajiji has recruited several big names for his campaign, including Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, International Trade and Industry Minister Azmin Ali, Perak Menteri Besar Ahmad Faizal Azumu, and former Sabah Chief Minister Musa Aman.
Different flag
Hajiji’s decision to strengthen his position has left some political observers wondering if he was unsure whether to retain Sulaman’s seat.
For this election, Hajiji will not use the BN logo, for the first time in his career for the Sulaman ballot. Before defecting to Muhyiddin’s Bersatu in 2019, Hajiji was the head of Sabah BN and Umno.
During the past elections, Hajiji had always won resounding victories in Sulaman. During the 2018 general election, Hajiji won 69 percent of the votes cast, the best-performing BN candidate in the state.
Although five Sulaman constituencies were created to form the new Pantai Dalit constituency, six of the remaining seven constituencies in Sulaman voted for Hajiji in the last election.
When making his rounds, Hajiji seemed to be a well-recognized figure in Tuaran and capable of drawing crowds when he spoke.
His central message was similar to Muhyiddin’s: that the people of Sabah will only benefit if the state government is aligned with the federal government.
Muhyiddin’s image as a leader navigating Malaysia through the Covid-19 pandemic has been the face of PN-Bersatu’s campaign in Sabah.
Hajiji himself is rarely seen on PN posters, other than Sulaman’s.
While Hajiji would become the GRS ‘top ministerial candidate would likely depend on how many seats the PN wins in the elections, his current campaign does not appear to have the influence of a future chief minister.
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