For a party which claims to have 100,000 members, it was quite a disastrous showing when less than 100 members turned up for SNAP's latest symposium held at the Grand Continental Hotel in Kuching over the weekend. The large function room was sparsely populated with a smattering of over 80 people and even this small gathering of so-called strong supporters gradually thinned out as the day wore on; a slight improvement from the 50 people who turned up for Sibu previously.
Despite the concerted publicity to advertise all their symposiums thus far, SNAP has not been able to mobilise even 1% of its membership to attend its symposiums. If the Sibu symposium of 50 odd members and now the Kuching symposium touted to be the biggest yet of only 80 members are anything to go by, then SNAP must immediately arrest this dwindling membership or accept the reality that its much trumpeted support by the grassroots is as good as non-existent.
Augustine Liom, one of the speakers at the symposium, was heard to be leading the charge against the BN on land issues. He spoke on land grab and abuses of the system as though he has been a champion of Dayak land rights since time immemorial. Very valiant of him. However, perhaps we should ask our learned friend why he remained quiet when he was a Sessions Court Judge and did nothing to rule in favour of the Dayaks who brought cases on land issues against the Government?
What about his fellow Dayak lawyers in SNAP? How many cases of NCR land grabs have they championed in court? It is indeed strange that all these years they have remained completely silent but have only now found their voices. With no credibility or track record to fall back on, SNAP's sudden championing of land issues will surely be its Achilles' Heel that the BN will take full advantage of.
Wilfred Gomez, attending the Kuching symposium, proposed that SNAP revive its battle cry – Sarawak for Sarawakians – as part of its re-branding programme. Such battle cries are noble. But such battle cries are also hollow if you have no basis to support your aims. Let me explain. SNAP is a local Sarawak-based party. Autonomy from the Federal Government can only be achieved with full Federal Government support. As a local Sarawak party, what ties will SNAP have with the Federal Government? If Pakatan Rakyat led by PKR takes over Putrajaya, will SNAP have any say in the Federal Government? What autonomy can it achieve without the support at Federal level? Will SNAP therefore end up like PBS in Sabah - an ineffectual lone ranger with an irrelevant and outdated battle cry?
Zaid Ibrahim's KITA and blogger Haris Ibrahim's MCLM have come out strongly pledging support for SNAP during the election. How well do Zaid and Haris know the ground in Sarawak? Have they started to stock up on fuel and reserved boats for the election campaign period? Have they formed local committees in all the constituencies SNAP has claimed? Will Haris Ibrahim get a rude shock when he does background checks on SNAP's candidates, as he so promised?
All this rhetoric by SNAP only means one thing. Its leaders are beginning to realise that no one is 'buying' their 'product'. And this only spells disaster as their Chinese towkay in Kuala Lumpur, so we have heard, has conveniently switched off his handphone. No Chinese towkay will invest in a lame horse, let alone one that has only one leg to stand on.
The crushing reality sunked in when Paul Kadang had to fly to KL yesterday to personally knock on the Chinese towkay's door, which we hear is firmly locked now. What financial option has SNAP got left?
To add insult to injury, political burnt-out Tedwin Ngumbang has thrown his lot in with SNAP. Depending on which rumour you believe, two possible scenarios are being whispered all over town.
Whichever way you read it, SNAP is screwed. Tedwin is just bad news. He owes money to the Chinese towkays in Betong and cannot show his face in Betong town. His 'popularity' in the Layar is close to zero and all he has been able to garner from the locals are guffaws. Is SNAP so desperate as to inherit a political has-been with baggage seeking an opportunity to further his own agenda?
But we have heard a third scenario.
Which brings us back to what we have been saying all along. Poor SNAP is being used, abused and screwed left, right and centre by the BN to split the Dayaks yet again. The tragedy is that SNAP knows it but does nothing to stop it. The question is, WHY?
Baca SNAP – Sundal Dayak ti bingking.
Read also SNAP - Get real or get lost.
Despite the concerted publicity to advertise all their symposiums thus far, SNAP has not been able to mobilise even 1% of its membership to attend its symposiums. If the Sibu symposium of 50 odd members and now the Kuching symposium touted to be the biggest yet of only 80 members are anything to go by, then SNAP must immediately arrest this dwindling membership or accept the reality that its much trumpeted support by the grassroots is as good as non-existent.
Augustine Liom, one of the speakers at the symposium, was heard to be leading the charge against the BN on land issues. He spoke on land grab and abuses of the system as though he has been a champion of Dayak land rights since time immemorial. Very valiant of him. However, perhaps we should ask our learned friend why he remained quiet when he was a Sessions Court Judge and did nothing to rule in favour of the Dayaks who brought cases on land issues against the Government?
What about his fellow Dayak lawyers in SNAP? How many cases of NCR land grabs have they championed in court? It is indeed strange that all these years they have remained completely silent but have only now found their voices. With no credibility or track record to fall back on, SNAP's sudden championing of land issues will surely be its Achilles' Heel that the BN will take full advantage of.
Wilfred Gomez, attending the Kuching symposium, proposed that SNAP revive its battle cry – Sarawak for Sarawakians – as part of its re-branding programme. Such battle cries are noble. But such battle cries are also hollow if you have no basis to support your aims. Let me explain. SNAP is a local Sarawak-based party. Autonomy from the Federal Government can only be achieved with full Federal Government support. As a local Sarawak party, what ties will SNAP have with the Federal Government? If Pakatan Rakyat led by PKR takes over Putrajaya, will SNAP have any say in the Federal Government? What autonomy can it achieve without the support at Federal level? Will SNAP therefore end up like PBS in Sabah - an ineffectual lone ranger with an irrelevant and outdated battle cry?
Zaid Ibrahim's KITA and blogger Haris Ibrahim's MCLM have come out strongly pledging support for SNAP during the election. How well do Zaid and Haris know the ground in Sarawak? Have they started to stock up on fuel and reserved boats for the election campaign period? Have they formed local committees in all the constituencies SNAP has claimed? Will Haris Ibrahim get a rude shock when he does background checks on SNAP's candidates, as he so promised?
All this rhetoric by SNAP only means one thing. Its leaders are beginning to realise that no one is 'buying' their 'product'. And this only spells disaster as their Chinese towkay in Kuala Lumpur, so we have heard, has conveniently switched off his handphone. No Chinese towkay will invest in a lame horse, let alone one that has only one leg to stand on.
The crushing reality sunked in when Paul Kadang had to fly to KL yesterday to personally knock on the Chinese towkay's door, which we hear is firmly locked now. What financial option has SNAP got left?
To add insult to injury, political burnt-out Tedwin Ngumbang has thrown his lot in with SNAP. Depending on which rumour you believe, two possible scenarios are being whispered all over town.
Scenario 1. Tedwin, frustrated with Masing's refusal to grant him further 'concessions' and 'goodies', has decided to try his luck with SNAP.
Scenario 2. Tedwin, once a trusted ally of Masing, has been forgiven by Masing and sent into SNAP not just as a mole but also as the pre-cursor to an eventual take-over of SNAP by PRS.
Whichever way you read it, SNAP is screwed. Tedwin is just bad news. He owes money to the Chinese towkays in Betong and cannot show his face in Betong town. His 'popularity' in the Layar is close to zero and all he has been able to garner from the locals are guffaws. Is SNAP so desperate as to inherit a political has-been with baggage seeking an opportunity to further his own agenda?But we have heard a third scenario.
Scenario 3. Tedwin has been promised a handsome sum by Jabu to muddy the waters at Layar. Locals are aware that Tedwin is related to Jabu and will not fall for this old trick employed by Jabu in previous elections.
Which brings us back to what we have been saying all along. Poor SNAP is being used, abused and screwed left, right and centre by the BN to split the Dayaks yet again. The tragedy is that SNAP knows it but does nothing to stop it. The question is, WHY?
Baca SNAP – Sundal Dayak ti bingking.
Read also SNAP - Get real or get lost.
10 comments:
Thank you antu beduru for brave to speak the truth. Iban must learn to hear the truth becos bn always lying to iban. Snap also lying to iban.
Stick to your job, if you're well paid for it .... or a drowning man will hang on to a sea snake.
If scenario 1 is true, why did Tedwin have to wait so long [five years] to make his exit? He could have frogged to another opposition party not when the election is looming round the corner.
Scenario 2 is very likely. But what is there for Masing to forgive him?
Scenario 3 also should not be discounted.
Tedwin could be a trojan horse planted at the back door by Taib with Jabu and Masing into SNAP to open its floodgate wide open [a trick or stratagem employed by PBB/BN to infiltrate into a securely protected bastion
space of SNAP]
If SNAP is in Pakatan Rakyat, PKR, DAP & PAS must tread carefully and watch out for any trojan horse in their midst.
What chance does Tedwin have of winning if Joe Unggang who is the SNAP candidate for the Betong area,
Jabu himself, PKR's and PCM'S cnadidates are contesting in BETONG (Layar, Bukit Saban and Saribas)?
Come to think of it. Why must the high court rule in favour of SNAP's deregistration near election? This raises more questions than answers.
what has Tedwin got to offer to be part of the wind of change? Tedwin has no credibility and his track record does not impress me at the least. This prove one thing, that SNAP is purely RECYCLING and allowing itself to be prostituted.
SNAP should be known as the GREAT DAYAK WHORE for prostituting itself shamefully to BN. Shame on you SNAP!!
SNAP i beg you please for the sake of Dayaks who have been manipulated by a minority race with the support of their blood brothers in Kuala Lumpur you should join Pakatan Rakyat.No more time left for the rebranding excersie.Can't you see you are suddenly being used as a tool by PBB.
You hit the nail on the head. All the hoo-haas about SNAP making a revival is poppycock. It's all noise and nothing else. They should have join forces with Pakatan but as history repeated itself, they wanted to go on their own and field a candidate in every constituency. And yet, the party is run by a bunch of old farts who have seen better days. Apart from it's past association with Stephen Kalong Ninkang, it has nothing to show. Every time they start to make a little headway, the leaders start to fight and split the party with their jockeying for positions. Personally, I think they are a loss cause. They are lucky if they can win a couple of seats in the coming state election. What it need is not a re branding but a major by-pass and a massive transfusion. After the next election, the leaders are going to pass their time sitting at their kampung house veranda swatting flies and mosquitoes.
SNAP history of aimlessly meandering through the political landscape, exchanging one sugar daddy for another as the situation warrants – mirrors the political journey of their predominantly Dayak supporters. Its also a sad commentary on the gradual political marginalization of the largest group in Sarawak.
Within Sarawak politics, its a no brainer that Pakatan Rakyat will not be able to challenge PBB and SUPP through urban voters alone via DAP candidates; Pakatan will also need to get the Dayaks in the interior to be onboard the dual-political party system. Taib has boasted about his presumed ‘fixed deposit’ in the form of Dayak/Bumiputera-majority constituencies.
As the presumed Pakatan front for rural voters, PKR must find it difficult to get through to the PBB,PRS and SPDP Dayak supporters until it can shake off its tag as a foreign, Malaya-based political party. To make matters worse, Dayak voters often fail to associate their local YBs with Taib’s administration and equally complicit.
If SNAP had been able to rejuvenate themselves with new blood,so as to be unencumbered by their history – but to have done it much earlier, perhaps 2 or 3 years before the State Election, they would be in a better position than PKR to be the face and guru for the dual-party system ,among rural Dayak voters. Lets not forget that the voters who had voted for PBDS, PRS and SPDP candidates, were also once – passionate supporters of SNAP.
Its hard to suggest what would be the best way forward for SNAP. If I were to echo the views of so many other commentators who tends to snap at SNAP’s apparent audacity to revive itself, I would feel “guilty” of shooting the dual-party system in the foot. On the other hand, while the party is still yet to be fully re-branded and injected with new blood, one can’t help but be disturbed by the seeming rudderless history of the party leaders.
Finally, I think there are many Dayak masses and politicians who would rather see a united Dayak group in the new alternative to BN for the simple reason that for the most part, the group are still easily identifiable by their socio-economic indicators. Only by being united, can they present a common aspiration within the political system – which would serve the cause of democratic reforms, by averting political marginalization of the minority and the lowest class in our society. Unfortunately, no political party is fulfilling that role yet. SNAP is aspiring to be the Dayak political platform but it still has a long way to go to establish its credential/sincerity while PKR is rightly, or wrongly – not/never – aspiring to be one.
u must be saying something right for snap to be snappin angry! heheheheheee!!
Those who write too much about SNAP were just pathetic lots..and not even voters themselves, with very little things to do in their little profession (low class jobs), that's why they have so much time...mantah SNAP...butoh lah jaga kain orang...some even don't have anymore longhouse and some NEVER bring his WIFE back to the longhouse...enda iboh aja bejako ke orang or bansa iban..fucking shame..
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