DAP parliamentary leader and long-time opposition politician Lim Kit Siang maintains that a Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) should be established on the 1985 Memali tragedy.

“Yes, definitely. I stand by my call for an RCI into Memali, as with all my calls for RCIs in the past (on other matters),” the Gelang Patah MP told Malaysiakini when contacted today.

In 1985, a clash broke out between police and villagers of Kampung Memali in Baling, Kedah, when the police tried to arrest Ibrahim ‘Libya’ Mahmood, a PAS leader suspected of heading a ‘deviant’ religious sect.

Eighteen people - Ibrahim, 13 villagers and four police officers - died in the fighting...