Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu

Bumiputera is a Malaysian political term and translates to son of earth. Being mentioned in the party's name, this directly relates to the ethnic groups that are seen as native to the state of Sarawak. Members of the party are solely of Sarawak Bumiputera ethnicity. In article 161a of the Federal Constitution of Malaysia, 21 ethnic groups are classified as "natives of Sarawak", among these are the Ibans, Bidayuhs, Melanaus, Orang Ulus and several other Dayak people, as well as local Muslim-Malays of Sarawak.

To ensure the domination of Muslim Bumiputra in Sarawak politics, PANAS and BARJASA initiated a plan of merger a few months after the local council elections of Sarawak in 1963. Initially, both parties were willing to dissolve themselves in order to allow United Malays National Organisation to enter Sarawak. However, UMNO was not interested in accepting non-Muslim-Malay bumiputeras as members. Therefore, the Malaysian federal government recommended that the two parties combine to form a new separate party. After a series of negotiations, Parti Bumiputera Sarawak was formed on 30 March 1968. On the following day after the merger, Abang Ikhwan Zaini was elected as the president of Parti Bumiputera, Tuanku Haji Bujang as vice-president, and Taib Mahmud as the secretary-general of the party.[3] According to Sanib Said (former curator of Sarawak State Museum):

The formation of Parti Bumiputera was gratefully accepted by the Muslim-Malays of Sarawak. Except for a few prominent dissenters, especially some of the former members of PANAS, the new party was supported by both the aristocrats and the young intelligentsia, the latter holding the more important posts in it. It may be justifiably said that at last the young intellingentsia had triumphed. But basically the formation of Parti Bumiputera was a final reconcilliation between the two groups and it opened the way for a new era of Malay politics in Sarawak.[3]

Parti Bumiputera exercised a significant role in the Sarawak cabinet under the leadership of Sarawak chief minister Tawi Sli. Taib Mahmud dominated most of the decision making. Parti Bumiputera and Sarawak Chinese Association were the members of Sarawak Alliance. During the 1970 Sarawak state election, Parti Bumiputera won 12 seats while SCA won 3 seats out of a total of 48 seats. However, not a single party command a majority in Council Negri (now Sarawak State Legislative Assembly). Abdul Rahman from Parti Bumiputera was able to convince SUPP to form a state government with him as the chief minister.[3]

Parti Bumiputera had already initiated negotiations with PESAKA about the merger of both parties in 1968. However, PESAKA refused to enter into a merger in fear that Muslim bumiputera members from Parti Bumiputera would dominate the new party, leaving its Iban and Bidayuh members sidelined. PESAKA decided to join Sarawak Alliance without a merger to preserve their interests in Sarawak politics. However, in the 1970 state election, PESAKA won only 8 seats, whereas 12 seats were won by Parti Bumiputera and another 12 seats by SNAP. PESAKA was not able to nominate a new chief minister from their own party unlike in 1966. Ultimately another negotiation was held between PESAKA and Parti Bumiputera in September 1972 and both sides eventually agreed to a merger on 5 January 1973. The new Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu party was then officially registered on 30 April 1973.[3]

The party was divided into two wings namely:[3]

• Bumiputera wing which consisted of Muslim-Malay, Melanau, Kedayan, Brunei-Malay, Jatti Mereik, and Orang Ulu members
• PESAKA wing which consisted of Iban and Bidayuh members

• To protect and defend Malaysia's independence, sovereignty, and character.[3]
• To uphold both the federal and state constitution.
• To protect and defend the principles enshrined in the federal and state constitution, especially on position, fundamental rights, and special privileges of bumiputera.
• To protect and guarantee the future rights of bumiputera.[3]
• To develop the bumiputera, specifically, Malaysians, generally, in the educational, economic, social, and cultural spheres.
• To promote and protect the feeling of harmony and solidarity of among Malaysians towards creating a strong united nation.
• To protect the rule of parliamentary democracy.
• To support and defend the United Nation's charter.
• To take effective steps in eradicating subversive movements which could compromise Malaysia's security.[3]

The party structure of PBB is in many ways resembles to that of the national party United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) due to the influence exerted by Abdul Rahman Ya'kub. PBB has four levels of bureaucracy namely:[3]

• General Assembly (similar to UMNO General Assembly)
• Supreme Council (similar to UMNO Supreme Council)
• Branches (set up in each state constituencies in Sarawak, similar to UMNO divisions which is set up in each parliamentary constituency in Malaysia except for the state of Sarawak.)
• Sub-branches (similar to UMNO branches)
• Each level will have its own youth and women wings

The party's general assembly is held every 3 years to assemble all party leaders and grassroot members to discuss party policies, responsibility of Supreme Council, and to elect party leaders into Supreme Council but does not influence party directions and policies. The party constitution was amended so that "the party's system of representation of at general assemblies in line with the system used by UMNO". Therefore, a chairman will be in-charge of the general assembly, allowing the party president take an active role during the assembly. The party's first ever general assembly was held from 13 to 14 July 1974, less than a month before the 1974 Malaysian general election. All the party's top posts were not contested at that time. In this general assembly, Abang Abu Bakar and Salleh Jafaruddin (Rahman's nephew) from bumiputera wing were elected to the party's executive committee. Alfred Jabu Numpang, from PESAKA wing was also elected to become youth chief of the party. He would later become deputy chief minister of Sarawak under the chieftainship of Taib Mahmud.[3]

The Supreme Council consisted of:[3]

• Yang di-Pertua (also known as President)
• Deputy Yang di-Pertua (also known as Deputy president)
• Vice-Yang di-Pertuas (also known as vice-presidents, consisted of 9 people)
• Secretary-general
• Deputy secretary-general
• Assistant secretary-general (5 people)
• Treasurer
• Assistant treasurer
• Publicity chief
• Assistant publicity chief
• Appointed executive committee members (11 people)
• Elected executive committee members (20 people)

During the formation of PBB, both Parti Bumiputera and PESAKA agreed to elect a PESAKA leader to become the president of the party. The party had 7 vice-presidents instead of the current 9 members. 4 vice-president posts will be given to Bumiputera wing while 3 will be given to PESAKA wing. The secretary-general post will be given to Bumiputera wing while assistant secretary-general posts will be divided among Bumiputera wing (1 person) and PESAKA wing (3 people). The rest of the party posts were given to Bumiputera wing while youth chief post will be given to PESAKA wing.[3]

• Chin, James. 2003: The Melanau-Malay Schism Erupts Again: Sarawak at the Polls. In: New Politics in Malaysia. Lok Kok Wah / Johan Saravanamuttu, Singapore: Institute of South East Asian Studies (ISBN 981-230-169-0), pp. 213–227
• James Chin. “The More Things Change, The More They Remain The Same”, in Chin Kin Wah & D. Singh (eds.) South East Asian Affairs 2004 (Singapore: Institute of South East Asian Studies, 2004)
• James Chin. “Autonomy: Politics in Sarawak” in Bridget Welsh (ed) Reflections: The Mahathir Years, (Washington DC: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004) pp. 240–251

• PBB website
• Youth PBB website
• Wanita PBB website