However, the Sarawak chief minister said it was conditional support.
Chong , Adenan said, needed to add DAP and its coalition partners in the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR) – PAS and PKR – to the list of parties to be banned from the state.
He was referring to Chong's call last February for a formal understanding when speaking of political interference from the peninsula in the Sarawak assembly.
“I'll wholeheartedly support (Chong's suggestion for a formal agreement on the ban) to keep Umno out of Sarawak, provided PKR is banned, PAS is banned and DAP is also banned, together with Umno,” he said at the Amanah Khairat Yayasan Budaya Melayu Sarawak (Sarawak Malay Cultural Foundation and Charitable Trust) raya gathering in Kuching last night.
“That I doubt he would agree on.”
Sarawak, Adenan said, “doesn't need political parties from the peninsula, and that included Umno”.
“We know how to solve our problems ourselves. We do not need outsiders to come and dictate to us,” he added.
He said Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB), the main component party in the state BN coalition and which he leads, could do a better job looking after the needs of the Malays in the state than Umno.
The four-party state BN coalition consists of PBB; Dayak-majority parties, Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS) and Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP); and the Chinese-based Sarawak United People's Party (SUPP).
Chong, who is also the Kota Sentosa assemblyman, had earlier suggested a motion to be tabled in the state assembly for a formal agreement saying “words of mouth and comments in media by ministers have no force of law”.
His suggestion came in the wake of former chief minister Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud’s final reminder to state BN elected representatives to protect Sarawak and “keep Sarawak for Sarawakians” before he stepped down to hand over the reign of power to Adenan.
Deputy Prime Minister and Umno deputy president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin and Umno vice-presidents Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal and Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi had all said that Umno would not come to the state.
Umno is such a sensitive matter that Chong in November last year was suspended from the state assembly because likened Housing Minister Datuk Abang Johari Tun Openg to be an Umno politician.
He was asked to retract the statement and apologise to the PBB deputy president, which he said he would only do if a motion to bar Umno was tabled by BN.
by Desmond Davidson
BN is also a Malayan-based party. Adenan must also pull out and disband BN Sarawak not just PR only.
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