Samy Vellu’s 21 years as MIC President has turned the Malaysian Indians into an "underclass" in Malaysia as the most marginalised and neglected group in the country

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Media Statement
by Lim Kit Siang 

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He said the Opposition had no right criticising the MIC for not looking after Malaysians Indians.

Samy Vellu’s 21 years as MIC President has turned the Malaysian Indians into an "underclass" in Malaysia as the most marginalised and neglected group in the country.

Although Samy Vellu would not publicly admit this bitter truth, the MIC national leadership is not unaware of this brutal reality.

In fact, a recent internal MIC document has made this shocking admission about the marginalised position of the Malaysian Indians after more than two decades of Samy Vellu’s reign as MIC President when it said:
 

"Presently, Indians have neither the political nor economic leverage to  break out of their vicious circle of  poverty, and they also lack the  necessary human resources, which in turn feed each other. They also have no financial, commercial or industrialized structure, besides lacking the necessary managerial  and entrepreneurial skills. Further,  their ownership of the share capital of limited companies has not shown much improvement over the last two decades. In fact, if their problems  are not arrested and reversed in a  timely and proper manner, then, in  all likelihood, it is almost certain that  Malaysian Indians will emerge as an  underclass in Malaysia."

This MIC document said that the Malaysian Indian community had been  left behind and "marginalised"  by the "remarkable economic growth and rapid industralization that has benefitted the wider Malaysian society at larger" in the past 30 years under the  New Economic Policy (NEP) and the National Development Policy (NDP), "relegating the status of Malaysian  Indians, who are largely from the  ‘working class’, to one of a ‘forgotten lot’".

This MIC document said:
 

"Although the  NEP and the NDP did bring about  many benefits, large sections of the Malaysian Indian community  continue to remain relatively  disadvantaged and underprivileged."

Who must bear the greatest responsibility for this shocking 30-year  marginalisation of the Malaysian Indians, except for a handful of MIC leaders as a result of scandals like the RM120 million MAIKA Telekom shares hijacking scandal?

Shouldn’t Samy Vellu bear the greatest personal responsibility for this shocking state of affairs faced by the Malaysian Indian community as a result of being left out of the mainstream of development in the past 30 years having been MIC President and Cabinet Minister for over two decades?

Can Samy Vellu tell the voters of  Teluk Kemang how the election of S. Sothinathan as MP for Teluk Kemang would reverse and arrest the marginalisation of the Malaysian Indians as a "forgotten lot" and an "underclass" in Malaysia, when for the past  seven general elections the election of  an MIC MP for the area had brought about this crisis for the Malaysian Indian community?

It is pathetic to read the catalogue   of  Samy Vellu’s failure after 21 years as MIC President and Cabinet Minister to ensure that the Malaysian Indians enjoy the full fruits of national development and progress.

The MIC document , for instance, made the following shattering admissions:
 

"Malaysian Indians are generally  considered to be a marginalized lot  in Malaysia. A majority of them are  trapped in the vicious circle of  poverty. They lack employment,  educational or other economic  opportunities, and have therefore  not been able to fully participate in  the economic development and well being of the country."

"The majority of the Malaysian  Indians in the plantations still feel a  sense of hopelessness and despair.  More so, as they do not have many better or more rewarding  alternatives if they were to move out   of the plantations, as they would    then have to engage themselves in  low productivity jobs (eg in the manufacturing or services sector in  urban areas), or ending up landless in their attempts to find adequate  settlement in squalid urban squatter settlements."

"The low socio-economic status,   and the lower self-esteem of the Malaysian Indians, has also affected  their educational achievements,  thereby contributing to higher  drop-out rates among the Malaysian  Indians."

"The share of  Malaysian Indians in the corporate sector has been  relatively stagnant over the last 25 years, especially since the NEP was  introduced in Malaysia. It only grew from about 0.8% in I970 to about  I.5% in I995."

If the MIC national leadership is prepared privately to admit that the 21 years of leadership of Samy Vellu as MIC President and Cabinet Minister is a failure for the Malaysian Indian community, turning them into an underclass and the most marginalised group in Malaysia, why is the MIC not prepared to make such a admission publicly in the Teluk Kemang by-election?

(7/6/2000)