UMNO’s suspended Member Parliament(MP) for Sepanggar Datuk Jumat Idris, disclosed that Parti Warisan Sabah’s (Warisan) president Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal had invited him to join the party after its formation but he declined.
Jumat said he declined several invitations because he remained loyal to Prime Minister and UMNO president Datuk Seri Najib Razak.
“After Shafie formed the party, he invited me over, but I refused to change allegiance because of my loyalty to the prime minister.
“Even if I had joined a party, it wouldn’t have meant I was jumping ship because I am a partyless MP.
“The elected representatives who jump ship are those with a party who then join another.”
Jumat was speaking during a get-together arranged by the Sabah Youth Council in Kota Kinabalu, Thursday.
Jumat won the seat for Barisan Nasional (BN) in 2013 with 22,845 votes, defeating his closest contender Jeffrey Kumin from DAP who garnered 13,403.
However, Jumat’s membership in UMNO was suspended for three years in 2015 after he openly criticized Sabah Chief Minister Musa Aman in a Facebook post.
In the post, Jumat had proposed that Musa be replaced by Shafie as Sabah Umno liaison chairman because Shafie was then an Umno vice-president.
Jumat said he would defend his parliamentary seat if given the chance to do so by BN.
“Technically, I’m not an UMNO member, but if the BN leadership thinks I’m good for the rakyat, I’ll work harder to contribute a seat to BN.
“But I don’t regret what I did in the past because, for me, the people are my boss and I’ll voice out what the people want me to voice out.
“But if they don’t re-nominate me, I think I’ll rest from politics.” said Jumat.
