In a statement today, Wong challenged Liew to evaluate the development progress of the Sandakan parliamentary constituency during his (Liew’s) tenure as MP between 2008 and 2013 against the performance of incumbent, Stephen Wong of DAP, over the past five years.
Wong also asked Liew to compare the progress, economic development and livelihood of the people in Sandakan during both terms.
“Liew ought to evaluate his and Wong’s performance as Sandakan MP and see who has contributed more for the constituency and who has failed to address the stagnant growth of Sandakan,” said Wong.
“Liew’s stand should be unbiased now that he is a member of Warisan.
“Hence, it is best for him to comment on the performance of the Barisan Nasional’s MP (2008-2013) and DAP’s MP (2013-2018) in the Sandakan constituency.”
Liew was LDP president when he won the Sandakan parliamentary seat but a party leadership tussle saw him sacked after his defeat in the last election.
Wong, who is also Tanjung Papat division chairman, said LDP had remained firm in its stand to keep serving the electorate in the Sandakan constituency, regardless of who the MP was.
He said the party supported Liew in carrying out his responsibilities when he was MP to enable the BN elected representative to also execute his duties then as deputy minister in the Prime Minister’s Department.
“Even when BN lost the Sandakan parliamentary seat in 2013, LDP never gave up on the constituency,” Wong said.
“For the past five years, LDP leaders, including deputy president Chin Su Phin, vice-president Lim Ming Hoo and central Youth chief Tsang Hieng Yee, have been working hard to serve the people in Sandakan.”
Earlier, Liew had taken LDP to task over a statement that Sandakan would continue to suffer if the opposition was to win in the constituency again.
Liew said LDP had conveniently overlooked the fact that the economic development of the state and Sandakan rested with the ruling government of the day, which should lay out policies, programmes and economic activities for the benefit of the people.
“To say that it’s the responsibility of the opposition to develop Sandakan is a reflection of the party’s inability to understand how a government functions,” Liew said.