DAP has announced its solidarity campaign drive to support its secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, who was on June 30 charged with two counts of corruption in the High Court in Penang.

Dubbed the 'Support, Sympathy and Solidarity with Lim Guan Eng (SSSLGE) 2.0' campaign, the party will hold town hall meetings, a special dinner and other means in support of the Penang chief minister.

The theme for the campaign is 'fight back', or 'lawan tetap lawan' in Bahasa Malaysia, DAP organising secretary Anthony Loke said at a press conference today.

"We adopted this slogan to show (Prime Minister) Najib (Abdul Razak's) administration and the BN government that we will definitely fight back because we view this as political persecution against the DAP secretary-general.

"Of course, Lim Guan Eng is a symbol, but we will not just highlight his issues. We will also highlight various injustices and scandals.

"This is not just about Lim Guan Eng, but injustice about the whole system," Loke said.

The first solidarity campaign was held in the 90s, when Guan Eng was jailed for 12 months.

Loke, who is also Seremban MP, announced the party had collected RM1.846 million as of last Friday, under the donation campaign initiated to raise the RM1 million bail sum for Lim.

He said the balance of RM846,620 would be channelled into the SSSLGE campaign, which is slated to start in Negri Sembilan on July 20.

Asked about concerns being raised over the possibilities of the donation money being misused, Loke said these worries were not raised by those who donated to DAP.

"Those who donated have all the confidence in DAP because they have donated to DAP all these times," he said.

Deserving causes

The party will discuss with NGOs on the remaining RM1 million, to be allocated to various deserving causes after Lim's trial.

"Among the proposals is a fund to help victims of political prosecution," he said.

Loke added the party will disclose details on the donations annually at the party convention, which he believed, was not commonly practised by other parties. The party has also decided to continue the donation drive, he said.

He also revealed that there would be question-and-answer sessions for members of public attending the SSSLGE town hall meetings, to air their opinions and clear their doubts.

He said the party was prepared to listen to the public's views, including on whether Lim should step down for the time being.

Previously, the DAP central executive committee (CEC) and Penang DAP had decided that Lim need not step down. DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang, however said he would collect the feedback from the people nationwide on this issue.

To a question on the necessity to call for a snap poll just to show support for one leader, Loke merely said," No formal discussion yet, but we do not rule out any option."

He added the party and Pakatan Harapan have yet to formally discuss the need to conduct a snap poll in Penang following Lim's prosecution.

"We have not come to that point yet. If we do, we will justify it to the public," he said, adding that the Penang snap poll issue was not on the agenda for the next CEC meeting.

It was reported by the Malay Mail Online that the Penang state leaders were mulling the possibility of calling a snap poll.

Other events in the SSSLGE 2.0 programme:

Dinners: Sungai Siput (July 23), Shah Alam (July 24), Temiang (July 28), Cheras (July 29), Serdang (July 30), Kuching (Aug 5), Malacca (Aug 11).

Town Hall meetings: Alor Setar (July 21), Bentong (July 26), Batu Pahat (July 28), Ipoh (Aug 7) and Kangar (Aug 8).