The MCA will take disciplinary action against any member taking part in the illegal assembly on July 9.

NONE MCA president Dr Chua Soi Lek said today that the party respected the right to assemble, but would not tolerate street demonstrations, especially the illegal rally which the party believed to be politically motivated.

"We cannot accept the objective of this illegal rally," he said after chairing the weekly MCA Presidential Council meeting at the party headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

He said the organiser of the July 9 illegal rally was being used by opposition parties to further their aims.

"Pakatan Rakyat (the opposition pact) does not have the integrity to resign from the state and parliamentary seats that it won with an electoral roll that it alleges is unclean.

"If they (the opposition elected representatives) believe they were elected on a tainted roll, they should have the political and moral courage to resign.

Why hold on to power and after three years say it (the electoral roll) is tainted," Chua said.

He noted that the opposition pact had taken part in 16 by-elections since the 2008 general election despite their insistence that the polls were not clean.

It was thus making a mockery of its own allegation and the planned assembly, he said.

On the government's decision to give amnesty to illegal foreign workers, he said the MCA wants the government to conduct a more in-depth study and come up with terms and conditions as well as the procedure for legalising them.

This was to prevent abuse of the programme by unscrupulous parties or agents, Chua said.

"We (MCA) have received complaints from employers that some agents are trying to encourage legal foreign workers to change employers so that they can make profit from the legalisation fee," he said.

"This would cause the former employers to suffer manpower shortage and productivity problems."

- Bernama