Candidate for Pakan seat to be named before nomination day - Adenan

The Barisan Nasional (BN) candidate for the Pakan state seat will be announced before the nomination day of the 11th Sarawak state election, Tan Sri Adenan Satem said Sunday.

The chief minister said this after attending the Leader-Meets-People programme to evaluate the support for Parti Tenaga Rakyat Sarawak (Teras), which is a splinter party of Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP), here on Sunday.

It was the second time the chief minister attended such a programme this week to personally evaluate the people's support for SPDP and Teras.

He said both SPDP and Teras had wanted their respective candidates to contest for the seat, but he felt that it was more important for both parties to support each other.

"If I pick (a candidate from) SPDP, you (Teras) must support BN. If I pick (someone from) Teras, the SPDP must also support BN. This is because both SPDP and Teras are under BN's umbrella," he explained.

Adenan said if SPDP and Teras could stay united and back each other up in the state election, their opponents, either from DAP or PKR, could certainly be defeated.

In the last state election, BN won the Pakan seat through Tan Sri William Mawan Ikom, the then SPDP president.

On May 15, 2014, following a domestic crisis, Mawan left SPDP and formed Teras.

Adenan also hinted that he would seek an audience with the Yang diPertua Negeri Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud to discuss the dissolution of the Sarawak State Assembly soon.