Mahathir to settle political storm in troubled Sabah

Mahathir to settle political storm in troubled Sabah

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad will meet party leaders in politically volatile Sabah state to discuss a controversial election pledge he made two years ago, reports said yesterday.

Mahathir said supreme council members of his United Malays National Organization (UMNO) had given him the mandate to settle a row over his promise to rotate the chief minister's post in the multi-racial state along ethnic lines.

UMNO, the country's largest political party, is the backbone of the state's ruling National Front coalition.

"I have said I will not make a decision until I have met the BN (National Front) component party leaders in Sabah," Mahathir was quoted as saying by the Sunday Times.

The prime minister had promised in 1994 during a fight to wrest the state from opposition control that the chief minister's post would be rotated according to ethnicity every two years.

Some 40 percent of the state's population are Christians of Kadazan origin, with another 40 percent Malay Moslem and the remaining ethnic Chinese.

But Sabah's UMNO, which leads the state coalition government, has thrown out the rotation pledge and passed a resolution that the post should remain with an UMNO leader.

The current chief minister, Salleh Said Keruak, who is of Malay Moslem origin, would have to step down on March 17 if the rotating system is chosen.

Mahathir indicated last week that he may retract the promise of rotation if all component parties agreed.

The prime minister said he would settle the row before March 17.

"I will resolve it once and for all before that date," he said.

Although the National Front lost the March 1994 elections to opposition Parti Bersatu Sabah led by Joseph Pairin Kitingan, an ethnic Kadazan, it later gained control following massive defections from Kitingan's party.