I refer to the Malaysiakini report Final reckoning for Ong.

Ong Tee Keat, the embattled president of MCA will go down in history as the shortest-serving president of the party if he resigns from his high post due to the delegates rejecting his leadership at an MCA EGM recently.

It is a shame, really. for him to resign as he represents the new face of MCA. For the first time in history, the Chinese community has a president who was elected by them and not by their political master, Umno.

Past history had shown that those who hold the top posts in MCA will have to have the ‘blessings’ of Umno’s top guns to remain in office. Those who show an inclination to be independent from their master will be shown to the door to be replaced with a more compliant one.

Lim Chong Eu and Lee Chan Soon, two former presidents of MCA, couldn’t get along with the former premiers, Tunku Abdul Rahman and Dr Mahathir Mohamed in the 60s and 80s respectively and thus had to vacate their posts. The former later formed Gerakan party which won the 1969 general elections in Penang and ruled the state until March 2008.

Ling Liong Sik, the previous president of MCA, managed to remain to his top post for more than16 years because he could get along with the then premier, Dr Mahathir Mohamed. He followed what his master told him and only resigned from office during the tail end of the fourth prime minister’s term in office.

Many Malaysians regardless of race have a high regards for Ong Tee Keat, a transport minister which did not leave any stone unturned in getting to the bottom of the Port Klang Free Zone scandal which caused billions of public funds to be squandered off by dubious means.

The embattled transport minister must have stepped of a lot of big toes by going all out in the investigations. The perpetrators who had ‘gang raped’ PKFZ may be some top guns from the MCA as well as Umno who do not like their misdeeds to be made public.

If other top politicians had the same guts and principles as Ong Tee Keat, our country will be on a different playing field altogether credibility-wise but the embattled MCA president had to be sacrificed at the altar in order for the PKFZ scandal to be swept under the carpet.

Being a man of principles, Ong Tee Keat has no choice but to resign as he had said earlier that if the MCA delegates rejected his resolutions during the EGM, it would be tantamount to a vote of no confidence in his leadership in the party. After all a gentleman’s word is his bond.

MCA can be considered a ‘headless party’ now as both the president and deputy will have to make way for new blood. Knowing MCA’s history of infighting among its top gun, the people are not sanguine whether the second-largest party in BN can reform itself for the better in order to win back Chinese support.

It will be a wishful thinking that all the problems besetting MCA will be resolved if Ong Tee Keat resigns from his president’s post. MCA needs a strong leader who commands the support of the grassroots and who is willing to stand up for the Chinese community’s interests rather than being a pliant leader who dares not go against the wishes of his ‘master who, anyway, usually has the last say on who can become president of MCA.

Ong Tee Keat is a rare individual who can lead the party to greater heights as he has shown great leadership quality. He dared to cross the line when the situation demanded that he do that. But good people never last long in politics. What a crying shame.