MP SPEAKS | I said at the opening of the DAP parliamentary service centre in Gelang Patah yesterday that we are in a new phase in politics in post-GE14 Malaysia, as Umno leaders and cybertroopers under former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak have abandoned all pretensions of moderation, balance and the ‘1Malaysia’ attitude to sabotage the Pakatan Harapan government.

They hope that the Pakatan Harapan government in Putrajaya and in the various states would not last the full term, crack and disintegrate to allow Umno to return to power before GE15.

I must thank the former Umno deputy minister Tajuddin Abdul Rahman for confirming that post-GE14, Umno leaders and cybertroopers under Najib had launched a ‘scorched-earth’ policy to take the vicious and toxic politics of race, religion, hate, fear and lies to an extreme never seen in Malaysia before.

In an eve of Sungai Kandis by-election gathering, Tajuddin made the wild, preposterous, reckless, most incendiary and seditious allegation that the DAP has an agenda to “Christianise” Malaysia, that that the DAP and “Christian-led Pakatan Harapan government” would want to abolish the Malay monarchy and establish a republic.

He claimed that there is a video featuring Christian pastors celebrating Pakatan Harapan’s victory during the May 9 general election, on the ground that the Christians have taken over Putrajaya and other states. I am not aware that there is such a video. Did Tajuddin concoct such an irresponsible story out of thin air?

I challenge Tajuddin to produce such a video, or he must be condemned and repudiated by all Malaysians, including all Umno-BN leaders, as utterly irresponsible and disreputable.

Umno should also issue a show-cause letter to Tajuddin why he should not be expelled from the party for such an irresponsible anti-Malaysian utterance – unless Umno-BN leaders want to adopt or associate with Tajuddin’s irresponsible utterances by their silence.

Tajuddin accused the government of being controlled by Christian DAP ministers like Anthony Loke, Tony Pua and Hannah Yeoh. I am not aware that Pua and Yeoh are ministers, but let me educate Tajuddin that although Pua and Loke have Christian first names, they are not Christians.

Tajuddin has committed an unpardonable political sin in Malaysia in accusing the cabinet of being controlled by Christian evangelists when there is not even an iota of truth in the allegation.

What is also most unpardonable is that after more than half a century of Malaysian nation-building, Tajuddin is trying to perpetuate the misconception that a Christian or non-Muslim is anti-Islam, and that a Chinese or Indian is anti-Malay – undermining the very basis of Malaysia as a multiracial, multilingual, multireligious and multicultural nation and that our very diversity in ethnicity, religions, languages and cultures is a unique asset for the nation and not a liability.

I do not believe that a Malay is anti-Chinese, anti-Indian, anti-Kadazan, anti-Iban in the same way that I do not believe that a good Muslim is anti-Christianity, anti-Buddhism, anti-Hinduism, anti-Sikkhism or anti-Taoism.

If Malaysia is to be a “beacon of light in a disturbed and distracted world,” as Bapa Malaysia Tunku Abdul Rahman said on Merdeka Day on August 31, 1957, Tajuddin’s politics of race, religion, fear, hate and lies should have no place in Malaysia in 2018.

I hope that the voters of Sungai Kandis will produce a result in the by-election which can send a clear and unmistakable message that Malaysians have no time for Tajuddin’s politics of race, religion, hate, fear and lies as we want to build a ‘New Malaysia’ and not a zone of darkness of kleptocracy and kakistocracy.

LIM KIT SIANG is the MP for Iskandar Puteri.

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