Polling eve message by Lim Kit Siang in Sibu on Friday, 15^th April 2011: 

Deny BN 2/3 majority in Sarawak polls to send powerful message to all Sarawakians and Malaysians – “Tomorrow can be better!”

Tomorrow is the polling day for the 10^th Sarawak state general elections – the most important Sarawak general elections in 48 years since 1963.

It is also the first time that a state general elections will have a powerful, immediate and direct impact on national politics and policies – thanks to the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak who “closed down” Putrajaya for six days and directed the entire Cabinet to campaign in Sarawak!

As a result, Najib has added a new dimension to the April 16 polls – giving Sarawakians the unprecedented opportunity to pass verdict not only on the performance and record of the Chief Minister and Sarawak Barisan Nasional but also on the Prime Minister and the Barisan Nasional Malaysia-wide.l

Sarawak voters tomorrow have a double-barrelled challenge – at minimum to deny the Barisan Nasional two-thirds majority in the Sarawak State Assembly majority to send two clear and unmistakable messages, viz:

• firstly to Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud that he should step down as Chief Minister not “in a few years time” but by tomorrow itself; and

• secondly to Najib that his signature policies of 1Malaysia, Government Transformation Programme and New Economic Model have failed to pass the test as they are just empty slogans bereft of real substance of reforms.

Najib’s 1Malaysia has been reduced into a “1 T-Shirt, 1 Tupperware, 1 burger” circus, after Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had declared that he is Malay first, Malaysian second!

Today, Taib gave Najib’s 1Malaysia one final cynical blow, abusing his powers of state immigration autonomy by denying one Indian, one Malay and one Chinese (Ambiga Sreenivasan, Haris Ibrahim and Wong Chin Huat) their fundamental right to enter Sarawak to “pursue legitimate political activity” to monitor the Sarawak elections tomorrow to ensure it is clean, free and fair!

Yesterday, the Prime Minister made a “passionate appeal to Sarawakians not to ‘ditch’ Barisan Nasional just because they are angry with weaknesses in the state and federal governments’ machinery or with Barisan parties or leaders”. (Star 15.4.11)

Clearly, the Prime Minister has admitted that the Barisan Nasional government and leaders, whether at state or federal levels, have gravely and greatly failed Sarawakians with their arrogance, unaccountability, misrule, abuses of power and corrupt practices.

All the more that the voters of Sarawak should at minimum tomorrow deny the Barisan Nasional two-thirds majority in the Sarawak state assembly to send out the powerful message to all Sarawakians and Malaysians – “Tomorrow Can Be Better!”

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