KOTA KINABALU, Sept 10 — After threatening to leave Perikatan Nasional unless his Parti Solidarity Tanah Airku was given more seats to contest, Datuk Jeffrey Kitingan is now saying he will compromise for the sake of the overall coalition.

Given just eight seats from the 15 demanded earlier, Jeffrey said he would accept this even though he was not satisfied.

"We are not happy but considering we are in a group, I have to accept that we are a team,” he said when asked whether he was happy with the outcome.

"So yes, we are still continuing with PN because it was created by us here so…” he said again when asked if he would continue under the federal government alliance.

The Tambunan incumbent said that he felt the 24 or so non-Muslim Bumiputera-majority seats should have been split evenly between a local and national party within the PN.

"But it didn’t turn out that way, so we just have to make sure we win. There’s no use having 73 seats to contest but only winning one,” he said.

He said that he still believed other parties should yield in more seats, naming the Bengkoka, Pintasan and Kadamaian seats among others.

"There are limited seats, so we have to give and take. What’s important is that we win the seats we are given,” he said.

Although it was not explicitly stated, STAR will contest the Tambunan, Bingkor, Liawan, Sook, Sri Tanjung, Moyog, Paginatan and Tulid seats.

Earlier, Barisan Nasional’s Parti Bersatu Rakyat Sabah had said it would contest the Sook and Tulid seats while Umno said would contest the Paginatan seat and was up for a "friendly fight”.