Tee Keat: MCA not a stooge of Umno on seats

VIDEO | 16.36 min

INTERVIEW Pandan MP Ong Tee Keat dismisses PKR director of strategy Rafizi Ramli's claim that MCA is subservient to Umno because the party allows Umno president Najib Abdul Razak to select all BN electoral candidates.

It has been a long-standing tradition, Ong pointed out, for the BN chairperson - who is currently Najib - to decide on the coalition's election candidates, rather than the presidents of the respective component parties.

This was because, unlike Pakatan Rakyat, the BN candidates contest under the BN ticket instead of their own party logos, he told Malaysiakini and KiniTV in an exclusive interview.

Ong was responding to Rafizi's claim on Feb 24 that BN is an Umno power monopoly , with even the status of MCA president Dr Chua Soi Lek's candidacy being uncertain.

"I think I can understand why Rafizi said that. He is a newcomer; he has yet to understand the mechanics of coalition politics. Pakatan Rakyat has yet to register itself as a single party," Ong said.

The five-term MP also said he was subservient to no one except to his own principles, ever since he was first elected as MP in 1989.

Chua is not in favour of political rival and former party boss Ong to defend his Pandan seat in Selangor, which will be challenged by Rafizi.

Having named a different MCA candidate, he reportedly threatened to quit should Najib decide to pick Ong to contest the seat.

How to fake popular support

On another issue, Ong said incidents where the audience apparently shouted ‘No' to Najib in Penang and Tourism Minister Dr Ng Yen Yen in Malacca did not necessarily reflect ground support for the opposition.

In the Penang incident on Feb 11, crowds shouted ‘No' to Najib's question whether Penangites were ‘ready for BN'.

In Malacca about two weeks later, Ng tried to convince a Chinese-majority crowd to shout ‘Yes' to BN's achievements, only to receive the opposite response . However, she insisted that the shouts of ‘Yes' were louder than ‘No'.

Since he was not an eyewitness to these incidents, Ong said, leaders on both sides of the political divide have been known to fake the appearance of popular support.

"When they want to portray a picture of having ground support, they will mobilise people, perhaps occupying the seats in the front rows.

"When these leaders announce something, you would see the front rows suddenly bursting into a big round of applause. I have seen all these and sometimes I choose to giggle at it," he said.

Ground reports may be misleading

Pressed further on what would be a better gauge of public support, Ong said opinion polls could be done but then again, there could be ‘hair-splitting' over the methodology of the survey.

Questions may linger on whether the survey asked an enough number of people, for instance, or whether their opinions were representative of the overall sentiments.

Ong is not in favour of ground reports from grassroots leaders, saying that these findings may be "doctored along the way" to the top leadership.

Instead, he said, he preferred to engage with the people in casual conversations.

"With my little experience in interacting with the people, not just in Pandan but outside Pandan, when you talk to people not as a politician but more as a friend, mingle around over breakfast or lunch, people will share their views.

"Much to your surprise, many a time this might not be close to the kind of claims political leaders make," he said.

Yesterday: Tee Keat says he's a different whistleblower from Rafizi

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This interview was jointly conducted by Sumisha Naidu, Lee Way Loon, Salhan K Ahmad and Koh Jun Lin.

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