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KOTA KINABALU – A victory for Gagasan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) led by Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and his allies in Sabah’s state elections on Saturday (September 26) has not immediately resolved the months of political turmoil, as the parties they failed to meet theirs. deadline for appointing a candidate for prime minister to form a new state government.
GRS initially aimed to get a new prime minister to take office before 11 a.m. Sunday, but missed the deadline as meetings between the GRS parties continued in the morning.
The parties met until early Sunday morning, but were unable to announce a candidate for prime minister at the time.
Frictions between GRS allies had been evident throughout the campaign. The GRS parties faced each other in 17 state seats, while both Perikatan Nasional (PN), which is led by Tan Sri Muhyiddin, and Barisan Nasional (BN), the largest component of their federal government, proposed different candidates for chief ministers.
Muhyiddin proposed that Sabah PN chief Hajiji Noor be appointed prime minister, while BN chief Ahmad Zahid Hamidi insisted early Sunday that the candidate must come from the BN Umno component, as Umno was the party with the most seats among the GRS allies. .
PN won 17 seats compared to BN’s 14, but Umno won BN’s 14 seats.
In contrast, Muhyiddin’s own party, Bersatu, of which Datuk Seri Hajiji is, won 11 seats.
The friction between the GRS allies was evident even after Saturday night’s victory. Both the PN and BN celebrated in different command centers and made separate victory announcements.
Reports also emerged that the Sabah governor’s private secretary said no swearing-in ceremony will take place on Sunday.
The uncertainty over the GRS negotiations appears to give a ray of hope to incumbent Parti Warisan Sabah and Acting Chief Minister Shafie Apdal, who did not admit defeat immediately after official results were announced Saturday night.
Instead, Datuk Seri Shafie noted that his Warisan party had won 23 state seats and remained the single party with the most seats among all parties that participated in state elections. His electoral allies won another nine seats, for a total of 32.
Technically, if any of the GRS’s main components chose to work with Warisan and his allies, Shafie’s party could still form the state government.
GRS ally Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) issued a statement on Sunday denying it was in talks with Warisan to form a state government, condemning such “rumors.”
Sabah has been mired in political turmoil since late June after Warisan’s state government collapsed following the massive defections of 13 assemblymen to the PN, then led by former Chief Minister Musa Aman.
But Governor Juhar Mahirudin agreed to Shafie’s proposal to dissolve the assembly and hold new elections, rather than allowing Tan Sri Musa to retain power through defections.
Sabah also went through days of political turmoil after the 2018 elections, in which Warisan de Shafie and the Musa-led BN secured 29 seats each, leading to a hung assembly.
Mr. Musa reached an agreement with Parti Solidariti Tanah Airku (Star), which had two seats, and succeeded in forming the state government.
But just two days later, the United Progressive Organization of Kinabalu (Upko), then an ally of the BN, chose to join Warisan, and Shafie, in turn, was sworn in as the new prime minister.
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