"3 Tuns in Selective Amnesia" - Will Liong Sik undertake that he will not copy Mahathirï¿½s example of selective amnesia when he appears before the PAC on the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal?

Media Statement (2) by Lim Kit Siang in Petaling Jaya on Sunday, 5^th July 2009:

Will Liong Sik undertake that he will not copy Mahathirï¿½s example of selective amnesia when he appears before the PAC on the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal so that Malaysia will not have ï¿½Three Tuns in Selective Amnesia?ï¿½?

Former MCA President and Transport Minister Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik has said he has nothing to hide and is ready to appear before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to explain his role in the controversial RM12.5 billion Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal.

Can Liong Sik undertake that he will not copy his former boss, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamadï¿½s example of selective amnesia at the Lingam Videotape Royal Commission of inquiry when he appears before the PAC on the PKFZ scandal, so that Malaysia will not have ï¿½Three Tuns in Selective Amnesiaï¿½?

In January last year, Malaysians were treated to the sorry spectacle of the former Prime Minister and former Chief Justice Tun Eusuff Chin competing with each other in selective amnesia when they were summoned to give testimony by the Lingam Videotape Royal Commission of Inquiry.

Mahathir said ï¿½I cannot rememberï¿½ or its equivalent 14 times during his 90-minute testimony before the Royal Commission while Eusuff Chin said ï¿½I cannot rememberï¿½ or its equivalent 18 times in his testimony.

Malaysians did not believe that Mahathir had become so forgetful that he had to invoke the ï¿½I cannot rememberï¿½ mantra 14 times in his short testimony especially as Mahathir was still famed for his poem, Melayu Muda Lupa.

The Malaysian public was really aghast at Mahathirï¿½s testimony because of the public perception that Mahathir had a reputation for remembering details others could hardly recall as illustrated by his mastery to recall effortlessly details of Rafidah Azizï¿½s excesses in the AP scandal without any prodding.

Can Liong guarantee that the country would not be presented with a third Tun in selective amnesia when he is called to appear before the PAC to give testimony about the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal?

ï¿½Three Tuns in Selective Amnesiaï¿½ will really be intolerable, insufferable, a great national shame and infamy.

In the past 36 days of ï¿½three questions a dayï¿½ on the PKFZ scandal to the Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat, I have posed 108 questions.

Ongï¿½s failure and inability to answer the 108 questions is akin to his failure to pass as Transport Minister and McA President like Shaolin disciples in ï¿½fighting storiesï¿½ who could not pass the gauntlet of the 108 movements of Shaolin Wooden-men Lane and 18 Lohans to to leave the Shaolin Mountain to out into the world.

I am taking a three-day break from the 36-day ï¿½three questions a dayï¿½ session and 108 questions and will decide whether to continue with the daily questioning on the PKFZ scandal, and if so, in what new form.

I note that Ongï¿½s ï¿½hired gunsï¿½ and ï¿½cultural assassinsï¿½ in MCA Hqrs continue to pour out attacks on me, which are issued in the name of MCA small fries and operatives from the various states, the latest emanating from Bukit Mertajam.

These ï¿½hired gunï¿½ attacks from MCAï¿½s ï¿½cultural assassinsï¿½ from the MCA headquarters, purportedly to defend Ong from my persistent questions to get to the bottom of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal, would support the decision that I continue with ï¿½three questions a dayï¿½ as I have no problem in coming out with another 108 questions to Ong on the PKFZ scandal.

I will announce my decision in two daysï¿½ time.

*Lim Kit Siang, DAP Parliamentary leader & MP for Ipoh Timor