Among others, he had to familiarise himself with the procedures of the Sabah legislative assembly.
The entrepreneur-turned-elected representative also had to learn to stand his ground during the assembly’s occasionally heated debates.
Outside the assembly, Siambun has been quick to learn the intricacies of government machinery.
He is now especially familiar with the National Registration Department, after helping some of his constituents get documents for themselves or their children.
Many of his Moyog constituents comprise farming families living in villages along the Crocker Range and for many of them, dealing with government agencies can be daunting.
One of the issues Siambun has helped resolve involved children who were unable to attend secondary school as one of their parents did not have an identity card.
Other cases involved children who were unable to obtain birth certificates as their parents’ marriages were not registered.
Solving problems for his largely rural constituents, totalling some 19,000, has become part and parcel of Siambun’s key performance index (KPI). About 90% of them comprise non-Muslim Bumiputeras, 8% are Chinese while the remaining 2% are Muslim Bumiputeras.
Siambun won the Moyog seat on a PKR ticket five years ago with a 1,682-vote majority in a four-cornered fight.
The contest for the Moyog seat saw Siambun securing 7,462 votes while Barisan Nasional’s (BN) Philip Lasimbang polled 5,780, followed by Danim Siap of SAPP with 779 votes and Bernard Solibun of STAR with 603 votes.
However, Siambun, along with Penampang MP Darell Leiking, who also won his seat on a PKR ticket, have since joined Parti Warisan Sabah, which is headed by former Umno vice-president Shafie Apdal.
Ensuring promises are delivered
Apart from helping his constituents solve problems in their dealings with government agencies, Siambun sees his role as a watchdog to the ruling BN state government.
“Our task is to make sure that what BN has promised is delivered because this becomes the people’s expectations,” he said.
Close to the hearts of Siambun and Leiking are a promised secondary school for the upper Moyog area and a new health clinic for Penampang, where the population has swelled to more than 200,000.
Siambun said the health clinic had begun as a hospital project in Kampung Dambai, with a groundbreaking ceremony in 2008.
However, a signboard was subsequently put up at the site, stating that a health clinic would be built instead.
“Now, even that signboard has rotted away and there is still no sign of a hospital or health clinic,” Siambun said.
He said the existing Penampang polyclinic, which had been operating for 40 years, was too small and constantly overcrowded.
On the proposed secondary school, Siambun said: “The secondary school at Kampung Kipouvo was promised in 2012 for villagers within the upper Moyog area where there are nine primary schools.
“But the school project was subsequently shifted to Kampung Babagon and there has been no further progress since then.”
In the absence of a secondary school in the area, children have had to enrol at SMK Limbanak, which is more than 20km away.
“This means parents have to spend several hundred ringgit on school bus fares every month as SMK Limbanak does not have hostel facilities,” Siambun said, adding that some of the children in upper Moyog had to stop school as their parents, who were farmers, could not afford the transport fees.
Acknowledging that his first term as an elected representative had been tough, Siambun attributed his difficulties to constantly being ignored by local authorities.
“When we go to the district office to highlight even a minor problem faced by the kampung folk, it seems as if what I’m telling them is falling on deaf ears,” he said.
An example of a chronic problem in his constituency is the frequent flooding that has been occurring for decades.
“This problem has been compounded by uncontrolled development in Penampang, as well as the poor drainage and hill cutting that has polluted the rivers,” Siambun said.
BN is keen to reclaim Moyog, with former Penampang district officer William Sampil saying an elected representative from the ruling coalition would be more effective.
Sampil, the BN-appointed community development leader for Moyog, said an elected representative would have access to funds that could be used for development of new roads and bridges or to repair existing ones.
“Without effective representation, rural folk are vulnerable and consequently face hardship. For example, they face difficulties in bringing out their produce,” he said.