Media statement by Lim Kit Siang in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, 1^st March 2011: 

Is Chua Soi Lek going to apologise not only to UMNO and BN but to all Malaysians for producing a MCA President and MCA Deputy President who betrayed the trust of the people and country in being involved in “grand corruption” of RM1.2billion PKFZ scandal?

MCA President Datuk Dr. Chua Soi Lek astounded Malaysians and the world with his smug reaction to the corruption charges against a second MCA Minister yesterday – former MCA Deputy President and former Transport Minister Tan Sri Chong Kong Choy – in connection with the RM12.5 billion Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) “scandal of scandals”.

Chua said Chan’s court case will not affect MCA. He said when a person was charged in court, it did not mean he was guilty.

He said: “We should let the legal process take its course.”

Chua’s comments raise many intriguing questions. Has the MCA President been given an assurance by the “higher-up” that Chan was not guilty of three charges of corruption laid against him yesterday for which a RM1 million bail was posted – and that the former MCA Deputy President would be cleared in the trial, most likely after the next general elections?

Or has Chua any good reason to believe that the corruption charges against Chan as well as the corruption charges made previously against former MCA President and former Transport Minister Tun Dr. Ling Liong Sik were just “a political charade” and that the charges would be quashed with the duo declared innocent after the next general elections?

Whatever the future outcome of the corruption trials against Ling and Chan over their role in the PKFZ scandal, the question is how Chua could come out with such a smug response yesterday that the charges against Chan will not affect MCA when for first time in history, a second MCA Minister was accused of “grand corruption” and betraying the Prime Minister, Umno, Barisan Nasional and the nation in the RM12.5 billion PKFZ “scandal of scandals”?

Never before in the nation’s 53-year history had a Cabinet Minister been accused of such “grand corruption” or of misleading the Prime Minister (Chan’s case) or the entire Cabinet (in the case of Ling) resulting in the country’s worst financial scandal – whether from Umno, MIC, Gerakan or the Sabah/Sarawak component parties of the ruling coalition.

Now, two former senior Ministers have been charged in court one after another for “grand corruption” and what should be completely unforgivable of misleading and cheating the Prime Minister and the entire Cabinet landing the country’s in the worst ever financial scandal – one who was MCA President and the other MCA Deputy President.

Chua himself said yesterday that “anyone who had committed an offence in the eyes of the Attorney-General should face the music” as “This shows that the Government is fair because it doesn’t just go after the small fish but also the big fish”!

Isn’t Chua, as current MCA President, going to apologise not only to UMNO and Barisan Nasional but even more important to all Malaysians for producing a MCA President and MCA Deputy President who had betrayed the trust of all Malaysians and the country in being involved in “grand corruption” and cheating the Prime Minister, the Cabinet and the nation in the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal when they were Transport Ministers?

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