KOTA KINABALU: Parti Warisan is sticking to bamboo poles to put up campaign materials to keep costs down and encourage environmental sustainability, say party officials.
The party has also created designated teams to search for bamboo sticks from forests near them.
"For us in the Inobong Penampang division, we have five teams comprising four to five people each who are tasked with this," said Fredoline Making, 53.
He said they would probably be able to find about 10,000 sticks throughout the campaign period, depending on available manpower and time.
"We managed to get over 5,000 bamboo sticks in our first batch and a few more thousand in the second batch," he said when contacted here on Saturday (Nov 12).
Fredoline said party members and volunteers would arrange for their own transportation and manpower as well as tools such as machetes to collect good bamboo sticks.
He said members travel all around the area to find suitable bamboo groves to find those suitable for use before harvesting what is needed and carrying them all the way back.
"From there, we wash, clean and cut the bamboo to size before attaching the flags," he said, adding that these are then put up at suitable locations.
Fredoline also said they would have to collect everything after polling day and to ensure all reusable and recyclable materials are not simply thrown away.
He said while they are not paid for the bamboo, they do get an allowance from the party for fuel and daily expenses, but noted this still costs less than PVC pipes or imported material from China.
He said there are some that import bamboo sticks from China.
However, he said he noticed that there were not as many flags being placed along roads compared with previous years.
Sabah has seen three elections in the last four years – starting from GE14 in 2018, the Sabah polls in 2020 and the ongoing GE15.
