Speech by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Kota Melaka, Lim Kit Siang, at a meeting of DAP Branches in Seremban Parliamentary Constituency at Temiang DAP Branch premises, Seremban, on Tuesday, 29.3.1983 at 8 p.m.
Lee San Choon, having led the five million Chinese up the garden path with his Seremban victory, had absconded from his responsibility when he is unable to give meaning and content to the MCA’s ‘political breakthrough’
Datuk Lee San Choon’s resignation as MCA President and Cabinet Minister is still the subject of speculation and discussion as to whether Datuk Lee resigned voluntarily, and if so why, or whether he was forced out by external forces.
Datuk Lee has denied that he was forced out by external pressure. What is most surprising is that the MCA Youth Leader, Datuk Lee Kim Sai, should ask for a special meeting with Datuk Lee San Choon to find out whether the resignation was the result of external pressures. If there had been no external pressures, there is no reason why such an important official as the MCA Youth President, Datuk Lee Kim Sai, should not know it. The fact that Datuk Lee Kim Sai had to ask for a special meeting with Datuk Lee San Choon would show that speculation that external pressures are connected with San Choon’s resignation is not completely without basis.
Of cause we will not know what are these external pressures although everyone can draw their own conclusions as to what are the type of external pressures which could force a national political leader to step down. Such incidents had taken place in our country, as when a top national leader was offered the choice of taking himself out from the Malaysian political scene with a foreign appointment, or remain in the country and face prosecution.
Datuk Lee’s reason for stepping down as MCA President and Cabinet Minister is that there is no better time for him to do so, as he would leave the MCA is in the strongest possible health.
Very few are impressed by Datuk Lee’s public reasons. This is because political leaders retire at their prime of life as in Datuk Lee’s case, only as a result of their poor health (as was the case with Datuk Hussein Onn), or from frustration and a sense of futility at being able to achieve anything meaningful politically, (which in a way prompted Tun Tan Siew Sin to resign), or in the category described by Dr. Lim Keng Yaik in a speech in Penang over the weekend that Datuk Lee is in politics for his own self-interest, and having served these personal interests, he has decided to pack his bags to depart and finally, if they are forced out by external pressures.
Does Datuk Lee’s resignation belong to any one of these four categories? He is not in poor health, and that excludes the first category. He does not claim political frustration, and in fact claims that he is leaving the MCA in the strongest possible health, which seems to exclude the second category. Dr. Lim Keng Yaik claims that Datuk Lee resigned for the third category of reasons, and Dr. Lim has considerable political experience working with Datuk Lee, and he might have more information than others. Datuk Lee Kim Sai, after meeting Datuk Lee, said that the fourth category does not apply.
Whatever the real reasons for Datuk Lee’s resignation, there is no doubt that Datuk Lee is absconding from his political responsibility to the five million Malaysian Chinese, especially after his Seremban victory in the April 1982 general elections where he claimed a mandate for a ‘political breakthrough’ for the Malaysian Chinese to regain their lost political, economic, educational, social and cultural rights since Merdeka.
When Datuk Lee contested in the Seremban parliamentary constituency in the April 1982 general elections, Datuk Lee said he wanted the Malaysian Chinese to decide whether to support the MCA or the DAP, and he asked for a ‘political breakthrough’ so that the MCA can provide effective and powerful political leadership to overcome and resolve the multitude of problems facing the Chinese community.
Datuk Lee won the Seremban constituency, and the time has come for him and the MCA, in the next five years, to show what they can do with the ‘political breakthrough’ and their promise of a new political, economic, educational, social and cultural era for the Malaysian Chinese as a result of MCA’s Seremban victory.
In resigning as MCA President and Cabinet Minister, without delivering the goods of the MCA’s ‘political breakthrough’. Datuk Lee had in fact led the five million Malaysian Chinese up the garden path and then absconded from his responsibility when he is unable to give meaning and content to the MCA’s promise of a new era for Malaysian Chinese in the 1980s!
In fact, if we look back at the short span of 11 months after the April 1982 general elections, the status and position of the Malaysian Chinese, far fro being strengthened as a result of the MCA’s ‘political breakthrough’ in Seremban and in other parts of Peninsular Malaysia, have become more undermined, whether politically, economically, educationally, socially or culturally.
Datuk Lee’s public reason for resignation, that the MCA is in the strongest possible health, should in fact be the reason for a new resolution by Datuk Lee to fulfill his Seremban promise to take the five million Malaysian Chinese under the MCA leadership to the ‘promised land’ of a Malaysia of equality and justice, instead of being excuse for him to abdicate from his political duty and responsibility.
By his act, Datuk Lee has admitted that the MCA’s ‘political breakthrough’ whether in Seremban or elsewhere in Peninsular Malaysia, means nothing for the Malaysian Chinese in their political, economic, educational, social and cultural conditions, that the so-called MCA ‘breakthrough’ in the 1982 general elections can only usher in a ‘break-down’ of the rights of the Malaysian Chinese.