Slaying the Huguan Siou in Kadazandusun heartland
 |
SABAH
It's seven in the evening, and already pitch dark at the edge of
Kampung Baginda, a short drive from Keningau town. The loudest sounds
are emitted by crickets.Villagers walk down a tiny lane, barely wide enough to fit a car. A group of women in sarong stops by a barefooted old man.
"I've snapped my slipper," he says to them. In his hand he holds the slipper for his left foot, which he says came apart when he stepped into a puddle some 10 metres away, as he stumbled through in the dark.
This, however, would not stop him from reaching his destination.
Soon enough, music blares into the quiet of night and the old man takes a seat in the front row, on the front porch of the home of villagers Roslin and Mary.
Some 100 seats were set up here in Kampung Baginda last night: Jeffrey Kitingan (speaking at front) is coming around, to meet with the people and talk to them.
Jeffrey, who leads the party Star, is facing off against his brother Joseph Pairin Kitingan for the Sabah parliamentary seat of Keningau.
The brothers had faced off in 2008 as well. At that time, Jeffrey was in a wheelchair, after an auto accident several months before the election in March that year. This time, he has been spotted dancing on the campaign trail.
But Pairin, who beat his baby brother by over 4,000 votes in 2008, has more than the entire PBS machinery at his beck and call.
He is also the Huguan Siou of the Kadazandusun Murut community, who make up 70 percent of the 43,710 Keningau voters.
Hours before, in Keningau town, an urban area not much different from certain parts of Kota Kinabalu, Pairin's position as the paramount leader was part of the BN campaign fodder. This time taken advantage of by none other than BN chief Najib Abdul Razak.
"If even I, a non-Kadazan, can respect the Huguan Siou, what more the Kadazan," Najib said, speaking from a large stage under a fancy tent at the Keningau sports complex, across the street from the best hotel in town.
Should we respect the Huguan Siou?
Back in Kampung Baginda, the crowd builds up as the Huguan Siou gets a lashing.
"We glorify the Huguan Siou too much, but we are not free people because of him. We supported him to be chief minister once, and in return we were maligned.
"They now say that Dusun people will even vote for a dog if it contests under the PBS banner.
"But
Pairin was witness to the petroleum agreement (which paved the way for
Sabah to get only five percent of the oil produced off its shores).
Should we still respect him?" one Cikgu Willie (right) asked to murmurs from the crowd.
Star, which has 370,000 members statewide, is popular with teachers. One, mathematics teacher Johnny Molibin, also spoke last night and his speech was met with nods of agreement from the women chewing betel leaves.
Ideas shared at this locals-only event sits on the far end of the spectrum, in terms of discussions related to Sabah's future in Malaysia.
Although Jeffrey does not advocate secession, he tells the audience that Sabah should be an equal partner with 'Malaya'.
Sabah, he said, is a country in a federation, like how Ireland is part of the United Kingdom. A vote for Star, therefore, would put an end to "Malayan colonisation".
"How can Sabah be equal to Perlis? If you put Perlis, Malacca and Penang into Keningau, you would still not be able to cover the whole of Keningau.
"We are a country, not a state... Malaya told us to join with them, or else the communists, Indonesians and the Filipinos would eat us up (nanti 'ngap'). So we were scared. But look at Brunei. They are smaller than us and were they eaten up? No. It was we who were eaten up (kena 'ngap')," Jeffrey said.
Blue tanks and big ideas
Moving closer and closer to the audience, Jeffrey speaks of big ideas but does not dumb them down for the people. "Do you understand me?" he asks. "My job is to teach the people what they don't know."
He
asked those who attended the Najib event earlier to raise their hands,
nobody does. Asked what Najib gave them during his visit, some answer,
"tangki biru" (blue water tanks) to the laughter of the crowd.
These tanks, distributed in the interiors during every election, have become a joke.
Located 140km from the state capital, after an uphill climb through the Crocker Range, Keningau has suffered water supply issues for years, and this problem is expected to be resolved by 2015 when the RM235 million water treatment centre is ready.
"Last year Najib came, bringing us debts. The federal government takes our money, and then gives it back to us as loans," Jeffrey said, referring to the cost of the water treatment plant, built with a loan from the federal government and which must be paid back by the Sabah government.
According
to Star campaigners, their leader has made much more inroads into
Keningau, compared with his efforts during the 2008 election.
In 2008, they said, Jeffrey could not even enter Kampung Bunga Raya in the state constituency of Bingkor, which he is also contesting this time.
Having meticulously researched the voting patterns, Star's election director Tony Minggir said Jeffrey lost out on votes from this area at both parliamentary and state levels. Today, Star flags flutter in the air in these areas.
Wearing BN T-shirts for RM30
"We
go house-to-house and they tell us they support Star. They're not just
being polite because when we give them a flag and they put it up, there
and then. We've even run out of flags," Tony (right) said.
On nomination day, he said, BN's flag-bearers wore Star T-shirts under their ‘Tatap BN' T-shirts.
"They told us they were doing it (wearing the BN T-shirts) for the RM30 payment, but underneath, they were with Star," Tony added.
Next door to Kampung Baginda, a dilapidated wooden community hall bears a huge picture of Pairin, a remnant from an event he had there earlier this month.
A
woman, sitting in a lone hut selling roast chicken across the street,
watches youths in BN shirts put up BN flags throughout the village.
Although PKR is also contesting Keningau and the state seats of Tambunan, Bingkor and Liawan, the party's flags are few and far between.
"BN is strong here," the woman said echoing the 5,000 in BN T-shirts who cheered and chanted Najib, Pairin and Sabah BN chief Musa Aman earlier yesterday.
However, Tony remains insistent that this would be the election where Jeffrey would topple Pairin.
"It will be very embarrassing if the Huguan Siou loses... but it is part of putting things right."
"I've snapped my slipper," he says to them. In his hand he holds the slipper for his left foot, which he says came apart when he stepped into a puddle some 10 metres away, as he stumbled through in the dark.
This, however, would not stop him from reaching his destination.
Soon enough, music blares into the quiet of night and the old man takes a seat in the front row, on the front porch of the home of villagers Roslin and Mary.
Some 100 seats were set up here in Kampung Baginda last night: Jeffrey Kitingan (speaking at front) is coming around, to meet with the people and talk to them. Jeffrey, who leads the party Star, is facing off against his brother Joseph Pairin Kitingan for the Sabah parliamentary seat of Keningau.
The brothers had faced off in 2008 as well. At that time, Jeffrey was in a wheelchair, after an auto accident several months before the election in March that year. This time, he has been spotted dancing on the campaign trail.
But Pairin, who beat his baby brother by over 4,000 votes in 2008, has more than the entire PBS machinery at his beck and call.
He is also the Huguan Siou of the Kadazandusun Murut community, who make up 70 percent of the 43,710 Keningau voters.
Hours before, in Keningau town, an urban area not much different from certain parts of Kota Kinabalu, Pairin's position as the paramount leader was part of the BN campaign fodder. This time taken advantage of by none other than BN chief Najib Abdul Razak.
"If even I, a non-Kadazan, can respect the Huguan Siou, what more the Kadazan," Najib said, speaking from a large stage under a fancy tent at the Keningau sports complex, across the street from the best hotel in town.
Should we respect the Huguan Siou?
Back in Kampung Baginda, the crowd builds up as the Huguan Siou gets a lashing.
"We glorify the Huguan Siou too much, but we are not free people because of him. We supported him to be chief minister once, and in return we were maligned.
"They now say that Dusun people will even vote for a dog if it contests under the PBS banner.
"But
Pairin was witness to the petroleum agreement (which paved the way for
Sabah to get only five percent of the oil produced off its shores).
Should we still respect him?" one Cikgu Willie (right) asked to murmurs from the crowd.Star, which has 370,000 members statewide, is popular with teachers. One, mathematics teacher Johnny Molibin, also spoke last night and his speech was met with nods of agreement from the women chewing betel leaves.
Ideas shared at this locals-only event sits on the far end of the spectrum, in terms of discussions related to Sabah's future in Malaysia.
Although Jeffrey does not advocate secession, he tells the audience that Sabah should be an equal partner with 'Malaya'.
Sabah, he said, is a country in a federation, like how Ireland is part of the United Kingdom. A vote for Star, therefore, would put an end to "Malayan colonisation".
"How can Sabah be equal to Perlis? If you put Perlis, Malacca and Penang into Keningau, you would still not be able to cover the whole of Keningau.
"We are a country, not a state... Malaya told us to join with them, or else the communists, Indonesians and the Filipinos would eat us up (nanti 'ngap'). So we were scared. But look at Brunei. They are smaller than us and were they eaten up? No. It was we who were eaten up (kena 'ngap')," Jeffrey said.
Blue tanks and big ideas
Moving closer and closer to the audience, Jeffrey speaks of big ideas but does not dumb them down for the people. "Do you understand me?" he asks. "My job is to teach the people what they don't know."
He
asked those who attended the Najib event earlier to raise their hands,
nobody does. Asked what Najib gave them during his visit, some answer,
"tangki biru" (blue water tanks) to the laughter of the crowd. These tanks, distributed in the interiors during every election, have become a joke.
Located 140km from the state capital, after an uphill climb through the Crocker Range, Keningau has suffered water supply issues for years, and this problem is expected to be resolved by 2015 when the RM235 million water treatment centre is ready.
"Last year Najib came, bringing us debts. The federal government takes our money, and then gives it back to us as loans," Jeffrey said, referring to the cost of the water treatment plant, built with a loan from the federal government and which must be paid back by the Sabah government.
According
to Star campaigners, their leader has made much more inroads into
Keningau, compared with his efforts during the 2008 election. In 2008, they said, Jeffrey could not even enter Kampung Bunga Raya in the state constituency of Bingkor, which he is also contesting this time.
Having meticulously researched the voting patterns, Star's election director Tony Minggir said Jeffrey lost out on votes from this area at both parliamentary and state levels. Today, Star flags flutter in the air in these areas.
Wearing BN T-shirts for RM30
"We
go house-to-house and they tell us they support Star. They're not just
being polite because when we give them a flag and they put it up, there
and then. We've even run out of flags," Tony (right) said. On nomination day, he said, BN's flag-bearers wore Star T-shirts under their ‘Tatap BN' T-shirts.
"They told us they were doing it (wearing the BN T-shirts) for the RM30 payment, but underneath, they were with Star," Tony added.
Next door to Kampung Baginda, a dilapidated wooden community hall bears a huge picture of Pairin, a remnant from an event he had there earlier this month.
A
woman, sitting in a lone hut selling roast chicken across the street,
watches youths in BN shirts put up BN flags throughout the village. Although PKR is also contesting Keningau and the state seats of Tambunan, Bingkor and Liawan, the party's flags are few and far between.
"BN is strong here," the woman said echoing the 5,000 in BN T-shirts who cheered and chanted Najib, Pairin and Sabah BN chief Musa Aman earlier yesterday.
However, Tony remains insistent that this would be the election where Jeffrey would topple Pairin.
"It will be very embarrassing if the Huguan Siou loses... but it is part of putting things right."
No comments:
Post a Comment