He said he declined several invitations because he remained loyal to Prime Minister and Umno president 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.”
He was speaking during a get-together arranged by the Sabah Youth Council here.
Jumat won the seat for Barisan Nasional (BN) in 2013 with 22,845 votes, defeating his closest contender Jeffrey Kumin from PKR who garnered 13,403.
However, Jumat’s membership in Umno was suspended for three years in 2015 after he openly criticised 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.
The then state Umno women’s chief Armani Mahiruddin, Sabah Umno Youth vice-chief Shahelmy Yahya and Sabah Puteri Umno chief Normalah Rasik demanded disciplinary action against Jumat whom they alleged had jeopardised the party’s image.
Jumat said today 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.”
Kota Belud MP Abdul Rahman Dahlan has been rumoured to be ready to switch to Sepanggar in the coming general election (GE14).
A BN source in the Sepanggar constituency told FMT that Rahman, who is a minister in the prime minister’s department, had already received the blessing of the acting Sepanggar Umno division chief.
However, another camp within Umno preferred incumbent Jumat to stay. They said if Jumat is not contesting in GE14, a local leader should take his place instead of an “outsider” like Rahman.
Among the names put forward by this group was Inanam youth activist Jerry Goh.