Media Statement (2) by Lim Kit Siang in Petaling Jaya on Friday, 5^th March 2010: 

First time in 56-year MCA history – fresh party leadership elections decided by external remote control

Who was the mastermind of the decision yesterday to halt the 56^th MCA Annual General Meeting to be held in less than 72 hours on Sunday, 7^th March 2010?

Not MCA President Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat though he subsequently claimed that he was the first to call for fresh party polls.

His first comment that his supporters had “expected this long-anticipated development” is the most eloquent admission that he was completely taken by surprise by Chua’s announcement – which was why the Bernama report of Chua’s shock announcement was preceded less than two hours earlier by Ong’s special interview as MCA President on the occasion of Sunday’s 56^th MCA AGM, which is as good as spiked!

Not the second MCA Three-Kingdom challenger, MCA Vice Chairman Liow Tiong Lai – though the Liow faction must be very relieved that finally MCA party leadership elections are being held.

If not Ong and Liow, was Chua the mastermind of the move?

Nobody believes that Chua would dare, or to use the Chinese description “have the leopard’s bile”, to abort the 56^th MCA AGM to be officially opened by the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak in less than 72 hours without any “green light” from above.

Malaysians are seeing history-in-the-making though not the most elevating one – as for the first time in the 56-year MCA history, fresh party leadership elections had been decided by external remote control!

But what does the new MCA leadership elections really mean to the Malaysian people, in particular the six million Malaysian Chinese?

There is minimal interest or concern among the Malaysian public, whether Chinese or other communities, for the MCA (or for that matter, the other Barisan Nasional component parties including Gerakan and MIC) has never been more irrelevant and inconsequential in Malaysian political history in the corridors of power to the extent that MCA leadership elections could be triggered by the pressing of an external remote-control button!

There is an article in the Chinese press today by a former Chinese journalist entitled “Talents and Serfs”, which captures powerfully the failures of MCA and other BN component parties in Malaysian politics – driving away Malaysian talents overseas to create a two-million strong Malaysian diaspora while leaving behind those in government positions whose first qualifications are to be servile and subservient to the powers-that-be.

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