GRS to finalise seat sharing in key GE15 meeting

KOTA KINABALU: Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) parties will firm up on the seats they will contest among themselves in the 15th General Election (GE15) during a key meeting on Thursday (Oct 13) night.

GRS deputy chairman Datuk Seri Dr Jeffrey Kitingan said the finalisation of the seats will allow the synchronisation of their list with their election ally Sabah Barisan Nasional, which is understood to have wanted 12 out of the 25 seats in the state.

Kitingan, who is also Sabah STAR president, said his party at the same time was eyeing four to five seats to contest, adding that he hoped to have the seat allocations resolved in the meeting tomorrow night.

Asked whether these seats included the Penampang and Keningau seats which Sabah STAR was speculated to be targeting, he said with a giggle: “Diam-diam dulu bah (lets keep a lid on it first)”.

“We will finalise the seats by tomorrow night in the GRS meeting,” he added, when contacted on Wednesday (Oct 12).

To a question whether he believed Sabah STAR would face a challenge in obtaining the seats they wanted as the seats would likely be the same eyed by Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS), he said: “No, we more or less know where we are and PBS also knows.”

Besides Sabah STAR and PBS, the other parties in GRS are the Sabah chapter of the Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Sabah Bersatu), Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) and United Sabah National Organisation (Usno).

According to sources, GRS and Sabah Barisan have worked out almost an equal share of 25 parliamentary seats for GE15.

GRS is expected to contest 13 seats while the Sabah Barisan coalition, comprising Sabah Umno, Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah, MCA and MIC, has agreed to contest in the remaining 12.

A key seat, however, being haggled over was the Beluran parliamentary seat held by GRS' Bersatu vice-president Datuk Seri Dr Ronald Kiandee.

Some sources indicate that Beluran might be a "free for all" if a deal is not reached while others said that leaders were working towards ensuring that GRS-Barisan goes into GE15 as a close-knit team.

Both GRS and Barisan leaders have not officially commented on the matter but some party sources have indicated that Chief Minister and GRS chairman Datuk Seri Hajiji Noor and Sabah Barisan chief Datuk Seri Bung Moktar Radin have reached a broad consensus on the seat sharing ratio.

The general agreement includes GRS getting some seven Muslim native and mixed native seats, with the bulk of the non-Muslim native and Chinese seats to be shared by its component parties.

On Tuesday (Oct 11), Perikatan Nasional chairman and Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had given his blessings to Sabah Bersatu to work together with Umno in Sabah during GE15 as the political situation in the state was unique.

While Bersatu and Umno were at loggerheads at the national level, Muhyiddin said that Sabah Bersatu was already working together with Umno in the Sabah government since 2020.