By Boo Su-Lyn | May 16, 2011
The Malaysian Insider
KUALA LUMPUR, May 16 — Former DAP national vice-chairman Datuk Chian Heng Kai died from liver cancer in Muar today. He was 71.
The former Bukit Mertajam and Batu Gajah MP was detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA) in 1976 for four years after fighting for the right of Malaysians to be educated in their mother tongue, the DAP said in a statement today.
Chian, who joined the DAP a year after it was formally registered in 1966, won the Batu Gajah parliamentary seat in 1978 and the Bukit Mertajam seat in 1986 and 1990.He won his seat in the 1978 general election while under ISA detention.
“Their commitment to defend the constitutional position of mother-tongue education in general, and Chinese education in particular, was strongly supported by their constituents,” said the statement, referring to Chian and another party stalwart Chan Kok Kit, who died in 2001.
Chian is survived by his wife Tan Chui Swee and three children.
His funeral is on Wednesday at the Seu Teck Sean Tong temple in Muar.