This is the first time that I am speaking publicly at a DAP function after I announced my retirement from the DAP leadership last March. One of the reasons is that it is at the invitation of the DAP State Johore as at the end of it all, I am a Johorian.
The DAP has been in the good hands of Anthony Loke and the DAP leadership and I declined the invitation to be a mentor of DAP because I wanted to establish that when Lim Kit Siang speaks, it is not the DAP leadership speaking but the views of one person.
I think I have somewhat established that position after more than a year and when I speak, it is not DAP speaking but only myself.
Let me give some of my personal views.
The Anwar unity government has two important tests in the next few months which will determine whether it could last five years — namely the May/June meeting of Parliament and the general election in the six states of Penang, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu in July or August.
There are three questions about the three-week meeting of Parliament which begins on 22nd May and ends on 15th June, with a week of recess in between.
Firstly, whether the Bersatu President, Muhyiddin Yassin or the PAS President, Hadi Awang, will get their MPs to move a vote of no confidence in Anwar Ibrahim as the 10th Prime Minister of Malaysia. Anwar has challenged Bersatu and PAS to go to Parliament to move a vote of no confidence in him if they have the numbers.
Will they do so?
The conflicting views of Perikatan Nasional (PN) leaders, some denying while others claiming that there was nothing wrong in plotting to overthrow the elected government in a democracy, shows that the PN is very divided on this issue.
But what is important is the silence for three days by the Bersatu President Muhyiddin and PAS President Hadi why they are not prepared to declare that they will prioritise political stability at this stage of the nation’s development and that they will not be involved in any plot to topple Anwar as the 10th Prime Minister by the way of Sheraton Move political conspiracy and will rely only on a vote a confidence in Parliament.
Muhyiddin and Hadi knew that after the December vote of confidence in Parliament on Anwar as the 10th Prime Minister, it would be virtually impossible to topple Anwar in Parliament — and the only way out is the virtually impossible feat of a repeat of the Sheraton Move political conspiracy.
But under the circumstances, Muhyiddin and Hadi are not really interested in toppling Anwar as the 10th Prime Minister, but in creating the political instability and turmoil that will prevent Malaysia from recovering to be a first-rate world-class country.
Secondly, whether the 74 Perikatan Nasional (PN) MPs will learn from their mistakes in the opening session of Parliament in disregarding the wishes of the Yang di Pertuan Agong and the various Sultans to work for political stability in the country so that Malaysia can recover its political, economic, and international standing by further polarising race and religious relations, and creating national disunity.
It is more productive and useful for the country to produce Malaysians, regardless of whether they are Malays, Chinese, Indians, Dayaks, Kadazans or Muslims, Buddhists, Christians or Hindus, with world-class achievements and attainments in various fields of human endeavour instead of producing Malaysians, again regardless of race or religion, competing for the worst in a divided, failed, and kleptocratic state.
Thirdly, whether the Anwar unity government has a programme for the forthcoming three-week Parliamentary meeting setting the national agenda that Malaysians should compete to make Malaysia race to be world-class role models in more and more fields of human endeavour than to race to the bottom as a divided, failed, and kleptocratic state.
All right-thinking Malaysians want the country to have a respite to reset and return to the original nation-building principles our nation’s founding fathers have entrenched the Constitution and the Rukun Negara, one of which is to be a role model to the world for inter-ethnic, inter-religious, inter-cultural and inter-civilisation dialogue, understanding, tolerance, and harmony.
Does PN support these higher national goals and missions?
We will get the answer in the three-week Parliamentary meeting starting on May 22.
In 1986, I moved from Malacca to Penang to make Penang the front-line state for all Malaysians, regardless of race and religion, to feel proud because of its commitment to the original nation-building principles agreed by the nation’s founding fathers — for Malaysia to be “a beacon of light in a difficult and distracted world”.
In 2013, I moved back from Perak to Johore to make Johore the front-line state for this mission.
DAP has made great progress in our mission but our work is not done and Johore has yet to become a front-line state and DAP has yet to become a political party supported by all Malaysians, regardless race, religion or region.
We must have the stamina, perseverance, and vision to continue our political struggle until all Malaysians, regardless or race, religion or region, are proud to be Malaysians.
(Speech by DAP veteran Lim Kit Siang at the Johore State Convention in Muar on Sunday, 7th May 2023)