RETIRED DAP supremo Tan Sri Lim Kit Siang has reminisced how in the first 20 years of his political life, he had been accused of being an anti-Chinese educated or an CIA, MI6, KGB or Australian secret service agent while in the last 20 years, he was condemned for being anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-royalty, communist and promoting Islamophobia.
“I am probably most demonised Malaysian in politics,” the veteran lawmaker pointed out in a media statement. “I am none of these but a Malaysian nationalist and patriot who regards Malaysia as my only home and country, who is born, bred and will die in Malaysia.”
“I believe that Malaysia is a plural country which can be a role model to the world of inter-ethnic, inter-religious, inter-cultural and inter-civilisational dialogue, understanding, tolerance and harmony,” stated the 82-year-old Kit Siang who was conferred the “Tan Sri” title after he quit active politics in March 2022.
As to how he has developed his sense of patriotism, Kit Siang recalled that he was a voracious reader who “read English and Chinese publications, including the Chinese ‘fighting’ stories rented from roadside stalls”.
“I was also a regular cinema goer, seeing the English and Chinese films in particular from the two cheap cinemas in Batu Pahat at 40 sen per session (there were four cinemas in BP altogether).
“I was a librarian at the Batu Pahat High School in my secondary school days and later became a librarian at the Batu Pahat Library. My ideas came from my school days in Batu Pahat, Johor. Yesterday (Aug 27), I visited one of my ‘mother’ schools – the Cheng Siu Chinese primary school.”
In his young days, Kit Siang had pestered his mother that he wanted to go to school. But since he was under-aged, his mother could only put him in a kindergarten near his house in Jalan Penggaram, Batu Pahat.
“Then I enrolled in Cheng Siu Chinese primary school in Standard One and Standard Two in 1947 and 1948 before I switched to the Batu Pahat English School in 1949 to receive six years of primary and five years of secondary education. But I continued in Cheng Siu night to complete nine years of Chinese education,” he revealed.
“It is in the schools that one learns the great precepts in life like the story of the Song general Yue Fei whose mother tattooed on his back the four words jìn zhōng bào guó (盡忠報國) which means “serve the country with the utmost loyalty” but the country here is Malaysia and not China.
“Or the story of Wen Tianxiang and his immortal words 人生自古誰無 (What man is ever immune from death?) and 留取丹心照汗青 (Leave me with a loyal heart shining in the pages of history). These precepts have guided me in my over eight decades of life.”
In the early years of DAP, Kit Siang who was also the country’s longest serving Opposition leader (29 years on three separate occasions) further recalled DAP’s fight for a nation-building policy of integration as against assimilation to achieve the objectives of “unity in diversity”.
“It was not an easy battle but finally we prevailed and even (Tun Dr) Mahathir Mohamad before he resigned after being the PM for 22 years, said in December 2002 that the Barisan Nasional (BN) wants to continue the integration policy practised in Malaysia to ensure racial harmony and stability in the long run.” – Aug 28, 2023
