Sarawak opposition pact unlikely to unseat GPS, say analysts

PETALING JAYA: An alliance of Sarawak Pakatan Harapan (PH) and Parti Sarawak Bersatu (PSB) may win them more seats at the next state elections, but not enough to unseat the ruling Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS), say political analysts.

Former Universiti Teknologi Malaysia lecturer Azmi Hassan and Oh Ei Sun, a senior fellow at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs, both said the opposition electoral alliance would not be enough to take power in the state.

Azmi said GPS remained formidable across many areas in Sarawak and the only way PH and PSB could win was if GPS encountered internal problems within the coalition.

PSB is led by Wong Soon Koh, and was an ally of GPS until July last year when Wong resigned from the state cabinet. Former Sarawak PKR leader Baru Bian joined the party in May this year, two months after leaving when the Pakatan Harapan federal government collapsed.

The party has two MPs and six members of the state assembly.

Sarawak PH chief Chong Chieng Jen has said there had been seat negotiations with PSB in order to form a stronger opposition challenge at the state elections, which must be held before August.

Analyst sees PH left with crumbs from Umno-PAS alliance

Chong, who is also Sarawak DAP leader, said his party would not contest against its partner PKR and had plans to even concede some seats, especially those in rural constituencies.

At the 2016 state elections, PKR and DAP candidates were fielded against each other in Batu Kitang, Ngemah, Mulu, Murum, Mambong and Simanggang. Both parties were defeated in the six seats.

Oh said DAP’s popularity was not in rural areas and giving up such seats would have no impact on the party’s fortunes. “DAP is not expected to prevail in these rural seats anyway, so there is not much loss for them to let go of those seats to PSB or PKR, perhaps in return for some of the more urban seats where DAP has a higher probability to win,” he said.

He added that PH and PSB were expected to complement each other, in terms of pooling their respective electoral strengths among the various communities and regions of Sarawak.

Oh also said that DAP and PKR were likely to better coordinate their seat distributions, after the departures of some of their leaders, which had affected both parties’ strength.

Azmi said the two parties had no other choice than to agree on seat allocations if they wanted to successfully take over the state government.