The DVD war on the tumultuous May 7 Perak assembly sitting between Pakatan Rakyat and Barisan Nasional took a new twist today when Mentri Besar Zambry Abd Kadir denied his state government is promoting the BN version.

zambry abdul kadir interview 200409 02 The confusion arose when Zambry at a media conference after the weekly exco meeting denied that his state government is backing the distribution of 50,000 DVDs to counter those launched by Pakatan Rakyat last week.

When asked by Malaysiakini as to when the state government would officially launch the DVDs to counter Pakatan’s DVDs, Zambry said: “This has nothing to do with the state government and maybe he (Mah Hang Soon) is doing it in his personal capacity.”

This is in sharp contrast to what Mah had told a press conference yesterday that the Perak BN government has embarked on a DVD war with Pakatan with the expected release of thousands of digital discs.

mah hang soon Mah said that there were three versions of the edited video - one with Mandarin voice-over, another with Bahasa Malaysia voice-over and a shorter clip, called the MTV music version.

Malaysiakini has obtained a copy of the Bahasa and Chinese version , both of which are 25-minute long.

Mah also said that the videos were condensed versions of the seven-hour assembly sitting, which has turned into the country’s most notorious assembly.

It depicted clashes between the state assemblypersons, complete with slow motion and close-ups, but minus the crucial footage where Perak speaker V Sivakumar was dragged out.

“The copies will be printed in the next few days and will be made available to the public. They will probably be placed in our Barisan component party offices or in the offices of our state executive councillors in the state secretariat,” said Mah.

Why is Zambry denying knowledge of the DVDs?

The question that begs to be answered is why Zambry is denying involvement in the DVD campaign, and how state cabinet member Mah be the main organiser without the permission from the mentri besar.

sivakumar being dragged abused manhandled by security unknown individual out perak state assembly chaos 070509 02 Both the BN and PR camps were involved in physical fights during the controversial assembly sitting with the two sides claiming that they were victims of naked aggression in the incident.

Pakatan started the war last week by going to the ground armed with a DVD on what had actually transpired on that infamous day.

However, police stepped in and confiscated the DVD, audio-visual equipment as well as detaining a technician at a DAP dinner in Sitiawan last week.

Perak DAP state secretary Nga Kor Ming told the police not to practise double standard when enforcing the law on the video recording pertaining to the assembly sitting.

“The law must apply equally to everyone, whether BN or PR. There should not be double standards when enforcing the law.”

Nga wants the police to take similar action against BN officials when they release their DVDs to the public.

The assemblyperson has also called on BN to show the full version of the event, and not the edited version, which depicted Pakatan in a bad light.