MORE than a month following the events of the 15th general election (GE15), veteran lawmaker Lim Kit Siang continues to raise the question why Perikatan Nasional (PN) chairman Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin is not the Opposition leader.
“Why is Muhyiddin not the Parliamentary Opposition leader? Is he retiring from politics?” the former Iskandar Puteri MP questioned.
“The answer is ‘no’ as [Muhyiddin] has not given up on the opportunity to become prime minister again and this is why he is not vacating his position as Bersatu president and PN chairman to give way to someone else to lead both political organisations.”
Lim said there were “at least three” reasons why the Pagoh MP does not want to become the Opposition leader.
“He does not want to be confronted in Parliament on three issues. First, he was the first backdoor prime minister of Malaysia who did not dare to test his legitimacy with a vote of confidence in Parliament,” he noted.
Lim also cited Muhyiddin’s move to “illegally and unconstitutionally suspend Parliament” citing a COVID-19 emergency on Jan 12, 2021 as well as his “abysmal failure” in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic which had resulted in the country having the “longest COVID-19 wave in the world” as reasons for the move.
“When Muhyiddin suspended Parliament and [advised the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to declare] a state of emergency to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, there were 138,224 COVID-19 cases and 555 COVID-19 deaths,” he remarked.
Lim noted that six months later when Muhyiddin resigned and the Emergency ended, there were over 10 times more COVID-19 cases and 24 times the COVID-19 deaths to reach nearly 1.5 million COVID-19 cases and over 13,000 COVID-19 deaths.
“Can any other political leader do worse?” he questioned.
Lim further threw shade at the former prime minister for urging the Government to take immediate action to ensure that the people are protected from the new COVID-19 variant that has been detected in several countries.
“While his point is valid, the question that immediately arises is whether Muhyiddin is the person qualified to talk about the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said sarcastically. – Jan 2, 2023
