Troubled Sarawak National Party (Snap) president James Wong Kim Min, 80, is rushing back from overseas to chair a central executive committee (CEC) meeting this Friday — eight days earlier than originally planned.

Snap party headquarters this morning informed reporters that Wong is expected back in Kuching tonight. He is scheduled to be on the 11.45pm flight from Kuala Lumpur en route from Sydney where he has been receiving treatment for a knee problem.

He left for Australia immediately after the last CEC meeting on April 20 which saw the controversial expulsion of the member of parliament for Bintulu, Tiong King Sing, from the party.

Tiong's dismissal precipitated one of the worst crises in Snap's 40-year-long history, resulting in Wong's leadership being openly challenged by a group of party dissidents led by deputy president Peter Tinggom.

It culminated last week in the rebel group holding their own CEC meeting — attended by eight of the original CEC members — and their decision to call a meeting on June 9 of the party's highest policy decision-making body, the national council.

Wong had earlier called for a CEC meeting in mid-June.

However, in response to the fast deteriorating situation, he directed the party's secretary-general Justine Jinggut on Monday to issue from Kuala Lumpur a notice bringing the date of the CEC meeting forward to this Friday.

Next course of action

Malaysiakini understands that the CEC meeting is expected to declare last week's CEC meeting called by the Tinggom group as illegal and unconstitutional, thus invalidating their decision to call for the national council meeting on June 9.

According to CEC member Michael Bong — who is Wong's brother-in-law — the besieged party chief will hold a meeting with his colleagues and advisers tomorrow morning to discuss the next course of action.

Wong has also directed deputy secretary-general Stanley Jugol, who is also political secretary to the chief minister, to consult the party's lawyer, Albert Tang, on the question of filing an injunction to stop the national council meeting from proceeding.

Tang today confirmed that there had been consultations but he had not received instruction so far to proceed.

"Anything can happen within the next one or two days," he added.

Legal sources say, the party should have little difficulty in obtaining an injunction because by granting one, the court is not interfering party decisions.

However, according to observers, filing of the injunction is a matter of strategy because one side will not want to give the other side enough time to apply for it to be set aside if an injunction is granted.

Meeting illegal

Meanwhile, one of the vice-presidents, Peter Nyarok, who is also assistant minister of tourism, confirmed today that he had received a notice of the June 7 CEC meeting issued by the secretary-general.

Nyarok, who is aligned to the rebel group, said however his faction would not attend the meeting as they consider the CEC illegal because, according to him, the appointment of several members by the president is not valid as it does not conform to the party constitution.

The party's last delegates conference in 2000 approved an amendment to the constitution to increase the number of appointed CEC members from five to eight, and the president went ahead with his appointments of additional members even before the amendment was approved by the Registrar of Societies.

It is understood that the amendment has now been approved by the Registrar of Societies and at Friday's meeting the president, after consultation with CEC members, is expected to announce the appointment of three additional members.

Observers say that with Wong's return and the CEC meeting brought forward to this Friday, it looks as if both sides are preparing the ground for the battle ahead.

This could see both sides going to the court to settle their dispute leading to the triennial general meeting in February next year.

Meanwhile, top Barisan Nasional leadership is viewing the crisis within Snap with concern, and several top state BN leaders are said to have indicated they want the party to resolve the crisis as soon as possible, ahead of the parliamentary elections, expected sometime next year.