Former Parti Bansa Dayak Sarawak (PBDS) president Leo Moggie today put the blame squarely on the party's former information chief Dr James Masing for the turmoil in PBDS today.

"Masing is paranoid about becoming president and suffers from a sense of insecurity to achieve that," he told a party gathering of branch leaders, members and supporters at his longhouse at Nanga Bejait, about 45km from Sibu.

"He will go to any length (to become president of the party) and I think he is not prepared to compromise unless he becomes president," Moggie said in reference to Masing, who is state social development and urbanisation minister.

Masing was elected president by his own faction at their own triennial delegates conference (TDC) in Bintulu on July 24, along with Sng Chee Hua as deputy president.

Daniel Tajem, who succeeded Moggie as president when the latter suddenly resigned on June 25, was returned unopposed as party chief in July when nomination for party posts closed. His running mate, Joseph Salang, was also returned unopposed as deputy president.

Biggest longhouse gathering

Today's PBDS gathering, attended by Moggie, Tajem, Salang and key party leaders, was described by journalists covering the event as possibly the largest political gathering in a longhouse.

The number was estimated at between 4000 and 6000.

According to Moggie, several more buses carrying party members from several places in Sarawak were still waiting in queue at the nearby ferry point when the meet-the-people was already in progress this morning.

"Many also couldn't find their direction to the longhouse," he added.

At a press conference later, Moggie who is also Minister of Energy, Communications and Multimedia, said some newspaper reports had suggested that the PBDS' troubles started after he resigned as president on June 25.

"The problems within the party started long before that," he said, reiterating that his decision to step down was for the sense of betrayal he felt after so many meetings during which Masing had made commitments and promises but failing to keep them afterwards.

Moggie said he had after the bitter party contests at the 2000 TDC tried to bring the two factions together by proposing a new top leadership line-up after he had stepped down as president.

Unfortunately, according to him, as he later found out, it was very clear to him that Masing had always wanted to be president right from the start.

Plan to oust Moggie

Tajem told the crowd that he had never reneged on any undertaking or promise as claimed by the Masing group arising from a meeting held in April in Miri last year.

He revealed that he refused to go along with a plan hatched by the Masing group at the time to oust Moggie as president and put him (Tajem) as president and Masing as deputy president.

"Moggie and I have known each other for a long time and we have struggled together for the last 20 years through PBDS," he added.

PBDS permanent chairman Edmund Langgu traced the history of the party, linking it with the original aims of the Sarawak National Party (Snap) in providing the platform to articulate Dayak aims and aspirations.

He told the crowd that when Moggie and his supporters lost in the Snap elections in 1981 and James Wong Kim Min became president, succeeding Dunstan Endawie, they had to form a new Dayak-based party PBDS to fight for the principles they believed in. PBDS was born as a result.

"Masing is not fighting for principles and it is certainly not for the community but for personal glory and interests," he charged.

Salang told party members that "there is only one party and there is only one president in PBDS."

He urged them to be patient and stand united behind the leadership of Tajem.