DAP’S Belief

Speech by DAP Secretary-General and member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at a joint meeting of the Malacca State Sub-Committee and Malacca Rural Sub-Committee of the DAP at DAP Jonker Street Office on Saturday, 17th July, 1971 at 4pm.

Last December, at a dinner oganised for the DAP at Dewan Hang Tuah, Malacca, I publicly disclosed that Alliance and MCA operators had been trying to induce DAP Members of Parliament and State Assemblymen t defect from the DAP and join the ruling party with offers of office, position, status and wealth.

I had then mentioned the case of Sdr Bernard Sta Maria, DAP State Assemblyman for Kota Timor, who was offered a State Executive Councillorship in the Alliance State Government of Malacca.

Other DAP MPs and State Assemblymen in other States had also been approached by Alliance and MCA operators.

But they have all failed. They have found that leaders of the DAP are an entirely different breed of politicians.

We in the DAP are not in politics for self-advancement, to pile up a personal fortune through political abuses, for office, position or status. If this had been the case, Sdr Bernard Sta Maria would not be with us in the DAP today but would be an Alliance State Executive Councilors in Malacca. Similarly, a few of the DAP leaders would today be Alliance Ministers.

For us in the DAP, the most important thing in politics is not office, position and status, but the political principles we champion and are pledged to fight for until their realization.

We in the DAP have a firm set of political beliefs and ideals. Our political principles are not up for sale in the market place to the highest bidder.

We in the DAP want a genuine multi-racial, democratic socialist Malaysian Malaysia, where every Malaysian, regardless of his race, has an equal stake in the political, economic, social, educational and cultural life of the country.

For these objectives, we are prepared to bear any burden and make any sacrifice – so that our political ideals for a Malaysian Malaysia cone true.

With the disintegration of the Gerakan party, the Alliance and the MCA are trying their best to wreck the DAP. Finding that the DAP possesses great party unity and coherence, our political enemies are trying their best to foment internal party strife and discord. They are doing this firstly trying to discredit the integrity and honesty of DAP leaders, and secondly, set the non-Chinese members on the Party against the Chinese members.

The Central Executive Committee of the DAP, which met two nights ago in Kuala Lumpur, and had discussed among other things, these latest MCA tactics, will not allow these merchants of mischief to succeed.

As Secretary-General of the DAP, and as Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, I can assure the people of Malacca who have put their trust and confidence on my party and I that we will never betray the sacred duty entrusted to us – to combat the forces of injustices, inequality, racialism, exploitation, corruption and suppression in this country as represented by the Alliance party.