KOTA KINABALU: Kadamaian assemblyman Jeremy Malazad will not be among former Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) members who are expected to join Barisan Nasional (BN) through Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah (PBRS) in Kota Belud tomorrow.
Jeremy who quit opposition Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) last year, has applied to join PBRS led by Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Tan Sri Joseph Kurup.
PBRS secretary general Datuk Dr Johnson Tee, when contacted yesterday, confirmed that Jeremy had put in his application but the party’s supreme council had yet to make a decision over his membership.
Amid growing pressure from Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) for PBRS not to take Jeremy into the party, Tee said a planned function in Kota Belud this Saturday was to accept former PKR members into the party but Jeremy was not among those to be accepted at the event.
“At this point PBRS has not made any decision on his (Jeremy) application. All I can confirm is that he has applied to join us and those joining us (in Kota Balud) are former PKR members,” he said.
Jeremy and Matunggong assemblyman Datuk Jelani Hamdan, who also won his seat under a PKR ticket in the last general election, quit PKR in November last year and were widely expected to join PBRS.
However, Jelani abandoned plans to join PBRS after purportedly demanding for certain positions that were rejected by PBRS. But he has since denied it and instead contended that he was approached by PBRS.
Jelani who has taken the stand of being BN friendly, remains without a party though talk has it that he plans to form a political party or try to re-join Umno.
Recently, PBS assistant secretary-general Datuk Herbert Timbun Lagadan who claimed that Jeremy was set to become a PBRS member, said PBRS must get the consensus of all BN components before they accept the PKR defector.
Herbert, who lost the Kadamaian seat to Jeremy in the May 2013 general election, said Kurup should get the blessings of Sabah BN and not act on his own by accepting winning candidates who worked against the coalition in the last elections.
PBS lost both it traditional Kadamaian and Matunggong state seats to PKR candidates and has urged all BN component parties not to accept the assemblymen after they quit PKR.
Herbert had claimed that Jeremy was scheduled to hand over his membership application to Kurup at his house in Kampung Tengkurus in Kota Balud at 2pm on March 29.