I ATTENDED the Aidilfitri open house of Penang DAP in Juru yesterday (May 21) which for the first time was attended by the Penang state Barisan Nasional top leadership.
The “Battle Royal” for state polls in the six states of Penang, Selangor, Negri Sembilan, Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu will take place in less than three months – and for the first time in Malaysian history – the outcome of the election would have a strong bearing on federal politics.
This is whether Malaysians can look forward to political stability and national unity, especially on whether Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s unity government can last its full five-year term.
The Yang di-Pertuan Agong has rightly emphasised at the opening of the national-level National Unity Week in Kuching yesterday (May 21) that all Malaysians should make unity the major asset for the nation’s future.
The Unity Government Convention last weekend (May 14) has pulverised the possibility that the Anwar unity government will be toppled ala-Sheraton Move in the three-week Parliament meeting starting today.
Notwithstanding this, the Perikatan Natioal (PN) opposition has been reduced to undermining national unity and fomenting chatter by Perak PAS Commissioner Razman Zakaria that the Perak unity state government would be toppled.
Razman said: “It is like if someone is planning to steal but whether it happens or not, we do not know. I do not know whose plans these are, whether they are true or not, but if it is true, then we welcome it.”
It is pathetic seeing PN leaders particularly from PAS reduced to depending on lies, falsehoods and fake news for inspiration and vision, instead of on policies and principles.
But they are only following the example set by their president Tan Sri Hadi Awang who still owes me six allegations which he failed to substantiate with any iota of evidence. Even then, he has come out with a seventh accusation against DAP at the same time he made the equally preposterous allegation that independent news portal Malaysiakini is promoting Islamophobia.
In his latest diatribe, Hadi accuses the Anwar unity government as “DAP-dominated”.
I think the best answer to Hadi’s diatribe is the former senior Bersatu and PN minister as well as former Selangor Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Azmin Ali who asked at the Selangor Perikatan Nasional Raya open house celebrations in Shah Alam last night (May 21) why DAP was “keeping quiet” about collaboration with UMNO and Barisan Nasional (BN).
Hadi and Azmin are not the same page whether the Anwar unity government is “DAP dominated” or not.
The impending general elections in the six states is also the reason why Kedah Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor made the startling statement that the present and past Kedah state administrations had been subjected to federal policies on land use which led to high poverty rates as Kedah had been “instructed” by the federal government to cultivate paddy, the cheapest but also the most important crop.
Is it true that the Federal government had instructed Kedah state to cultivate paddy – thus, causing it to be the second poorest state in the country after Kelantan – since Merdeka in 1957?
The first three prime ministers (PM) Tunku Abdul Rahman, Tun Razak and Tun Hussein Onn are no more with us but what has Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad who was the PM for more than six terms covering some 24 years, from 1981 to 2003 and again from May 2018 to February 2020, got to say about the Sanusi’s claim that Kedah had been instructed by the Federal government to cultivate paddy which led to high poverty rates.
What about the fifth, sixth, eighth and ninth PMs? What have they got to say? Has the 10th PM Anwar issued a directive to Kedah state government to continue to plant paddy and be the second poorest state in Malaysia?
Hadi is now very close to Dr Mahathir having signed the latter’s Malay Proclamation.
Does Hadi agree that Sanusi is right that the Federal government had asked Kedah to cultivate paddy, hence this was one of the major causes of Malay poverty for which Dr Mahathir must bear responsibility? – May 22, 2023
Veteran lawmaker and retired DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang was the former MP for Iskandar Puteri.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
Main pic credit: Amal Media
