Citing a previous statement by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang pointed out that the controversial remark made by Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi in Utusan Malaysia last Thursday was, in fact, an official stance of the whole cabinet.

najib new cabinet 150513 He said it was Najib ( right ) who, at the two-hour briefing to the new cabinet after the swearing-in ceremony on Thursday, laid down the law that "whatever (issue) raised by cabinet members is not in the name of the individual, but something that represents the government and is a common stand".

According to Lim, the premier also said that "whatever we do, it must be in the name of the government; we do not move in compartments or our respective silos".

Hence, Lim stressed that Zahid's call to Malaysians who were not happy with the current electoral system to "migrate elsewhere" is the official stand of the government, unless the cabinet during its meeting on this coming Wednesday publicly and collectively repudiates what Zahid had said.

The proposed parliamentary censure motion against Zahid is also a censure motion against Najib and the entire cabinet for not openly repudiating Zahid's position, Lim elaborated.

Lim was responding to Zahid's remark in Utusan Malaysia today that he is not afraid of facing Lim's proposal to move a motion during the new Parliament sitting in mid-June to censure him over his earlier statement.

In the editorial piece published in Utusan Malaysia last Thursday, Zahid argued that Malaysia does not adopt a system that recognises the popular vote since the country practises the Westminster system of 'first past the post', as do several other Commonwealth countries.

NONE Hence, those who want to use the other system of single transferable votes as used in the republics should migrate to those countries to practise this kind of political belief, he said.

Lim, in a statement issued later today, challenged Zahid ( left ) to get Najib's agreement for one full day reserved in the first week of the new Parliament sitting to debate the censure motion against him, if he is indeed not afraid of it.

The Gelang Patah MP claimed that Najib and all the other ministers are also worried and mortally afraid of the censure motion because they would be forced to take a stance over Zahid's statement.

"I will not be surprised if several of the 133 BN MPs would absent themselves from the division to dissociate and repudiate Zahid's call," he alleged.