MCA Deputy President Datuk Seri Wee Ka Siong has suddenly put on the garb as an anti-corruption crusader although neither Wee nor any MCA Minister, Member of Parliament or leader had done or said anything to check the downward slide of Malaysia on the annual Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI) in the past two decades.
Both Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, the MCA President, and Wee Ka, the MCA Deputy President, had been in Parliament and Cabinet for the last two decades, when Malaysia’s TI CPI plunged from 32ndranking in 1999 (when Liow was first elected to Parliament) to No. 39 in 2004 (when Wee was first elected to Parliament), and today, to the lowest TI CPI ranking of all – No. 62 out of 180 countries in the latest TI CPI 2017!
But both Liow and Wee’s records in the past two decades in the fight against corruption and abuses of power were a total blank sheet!
But in the past month, Wee had put on the garb of an anti-corruption crusader, although he dared not breathe a word about international multi-billion dollar 1MDB money-laundering scandal and Malaysia’s world-wide infamy, ignominy and iniquity of being regarded world-wide as a global kleptocracy!
All Wee was interested was to rain almost daily attacks on Penang Pakatan Harapan State Government’s undersea tunnel project and to tar and stain the image of the Penang Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng.
Is this the quid pro quo for the top three MCA leaders contesting in Malay-majority constituencies and dependence on UMNO’s Malay votes for the trio to get into Parliament and Cabinet?
The question that Wee must answer is whether Wee’s efforts to distract attention from 1MDB scandal and Malaysia as a global kleptocracy by attacking Penang undersea tunnel project and tarnish Lim Guan Eng’s image a quid pro quo for UMNO helping the three top MCA leaders to get elected into Parliament on UMNO’s Malay votes?
I had noted that the MCA leadership had created history never before in the 69-year history of MCA, where all the three top MCA leaders, the MCA President, MCA Deputy President and MCA Secretary-General have to depend on UMNO’s Malay votes to be re-elected to Parliament and be appointed Minister in the Cabinet.
In Bentong, the parliamentary constituency of the MCA President and Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, the single biggest ethnic bloc of voters are 46.1% Malay voters, as Chinese voters represent 42.4%, Indians 9.0% and Others 2.5%.
In Ayer Hitam, Wee’s parliamentary constituency, the largest ethnic group of voters are the 57.6% Malay voters, with the Chinese 38.3%; Indians 3.9% and Others 0.2%.
In Tanjong Malim, the parliamentary constituency of the MCA Secretary-General and Second Minister for Trade and Industry, Datuk Ong Ka Chuan, the largest ethnic group of voters are again the Malays 55.4% with Chinese 25.8%, Indians 13.2% and Orang Asli 5.6%.
In fact, this applies to six of the seven parliamentary seats won by MCA in the 13th General Election, although MCA claims to be the only political party in the country which exclusively represents the Chinese!
But there is a strong possibility that the MCA leadership may be making the wrong political chess moves.
If there is a Malay political tsunami in the 14th General Election, then UMNO will not be able to swing Malay voter support even for UMNO candidates, let alone the three top MCA leaders, as the swing of Malay votes in the 14th General Election will be to Pakatan Harapan!
Are we then going to have a spectacle of the MCA blaming UMNO for failing to get the three top MCA leaders elected to Parliament and the Cabinet?
(Media Statement in Parliament on Tuesday, 6th March 2018)