DAP has hit out at Perak MCA chief Mah Hang Soon for allegedly using the late Kuala Kangsar MP incumbent Wan Mohammad Khair-il’s name in vain without permission from his widow.

"Mah should not have used Khair-il’s name in vain or has he got the permission from his widow to use her late husband’s name saying that he would have opposed Hadi’s hudud bill, and the ministerial motion to fast-track it?" said party supremo Lim Kit Siang in a statement today.

The Gelang Patah MP expressed shock at having seen Mah use the deceased MP's name in the Kuala Kangsar by-election campaign yesterday.

Mah had claimed that if Khair-il were still in Parliament, he would not have agreed with Hadi’s bill, nor the ministerial motion fast-tracking the draft law on the last day of Parliament on May 26.

This was according to a letter Mah wrote that appeared in the June edition of the “Perak View”, distributed in Kuala Kangsar by the MCA by-election campaign team led by MCA Wanita chief Heng Seai Kie.

Lim wondered about the decorum of making use of a dead person's name, as well as if it would affect MCA's claims to oppose hudud or any law or motion that would enable it.

He argued that since the late incumbent's widow Mastura Mohd Yazid was now BN's candidate for the Kuala Kangsar by-election, Mah should have obtained her assurance that she would oppose Hadi's bill and any motion to fast-track it if she were elected.

Lim also expressed shock at Heng’s claim that Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Azalina Othman Said did not represent BN when she brought Hadi’s hudud bill forward in Parliament on May 26.

Azalina herself had said that she moved the motion after getting the green light from Umno president Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak and his deputy Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, despite reservations from BN component parties.

Lim wondered if there was truth to the accounts that the government in power was not BN, but one that represented mainly Umno interests.

He asked whether Heng would now call for Azalina's sacking as she had appeared to have committed a gross breach of trust against the views of all BN parties.

Heng's claim that “MCA’s conscience was clear as it had not betrayed the Chinese community” was even more befuddling, said Lim.

The veteran politician said Heng provided a classic case of “eyes that see not, ears that hear not, mouth that speaks not, conscience that feels not”, adding that he believed the phrase best described the current batch of MCA leaders.