Keeping in touch with grassroots

suppadmin | December 2, 2013

President of SUPP, Tan Sri Peter Chin who held a 7-hour meeting with 72 Central Committee (CC) members today (01 Dec 2013) urged them to go back to their respective branches and erased the names of the members who had passed on.

Chin who held a press conference after the CC meeting told reporters that there were around 3 percent of elderly members who had passed on and their names were still in the party member list. The party has 118,000 members.

He advised the CC members to go back and verified the name list and it was important they do so as the Triennial Delegates Conference (TDC) would be on next year. He said it was to prevent a repeat of what had happened in the last TDC where there was accusation of irregularities by losers of the party election.

On the complaints, Chin said the problem pertaining to Bekenu and Piasau was mostly technical than anything, as they had held the election in a normal procedure.” But still, we do not want any shortcoming for some to go and lodge complaints against us thus we want to ensure that things are done accordingly to the procedure,” he added.

Calling the meeting a frank one, Chin said the CC members had stated their points, their suggestions and their grievances. “We want the members to come to us on any matters instead of keeping it all bogged inside them. We as the CWC members should also enlighten them on any changes or any issues of the party,” he said.

When asked about the old guards and those who lost to leave the party, Chin pointed out that it was normal for the elderly SUPP leaders to take leave and let the young ones take over. He said that was why they had the TDC to elect in leaders according to what the grass root leaders want.

He, however disagreed that should a young leader lost once in an election, they should leave. Chin cited an example where Wong Soon Koh lost once in the election and returned back to fight again and he is a Minister today.

He believes that a young candidate should come back to stand even though he has lost once as it is illogical for the young losing candidate to give up immediately as they may have a lot to contribute to the party.