Speech by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Kota Melaka, Lim Kit Siang, at the DAP Malacca ceramag to launch the DAP’s nation-wide ‘Deny Barisan Nasional Two-Third Majority’ campaign held at the Pay Fong Chinese Independent Secondary School Hall in Malacca on Friday, 25th April 1986 at 9 pm
Denial of Barisan Nasional two-third majority is the essential pre-cindition for restoration of democracy to halt the relentless erosion of human rights and fundameltal liberties of Malaysians
Thirty years ago, in February 1956, on his return from London, Tunku Abdul Rahman came to Malacca to announce 31th August 1957 as the day Malaya would gain independence.
Thirty years later, the DAP is also announcing from Malacca the target date of the next general elections as the occasion for the Malaysian people to regain their lost freedoms promised 30 years ago, to restore democracy and to put a halt to the relentless erosion of human rights and fundamental liberties of Malaysians, by the denial of two-third parliamentary majority to the Barisan Nasional.
In the last 30 years, the promise of a liberal, democratic, just and equal Malaysian nation, fully respecting the multi-racial, multi-lingual, multi-cultural and multi-religious basis of nationhood had been dishonoured, and the last four years since the 1982 general elections in particular, there was an unprecedented and wide ranging erosion of the political, economic, educational, cultural, religious and citizenship rights of the people.
For the first 20 years of Malaysia’s independence, despite four emergencies, the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech and expression was still given respect, and political parties could hold public rallies to explain their policies and the national issues to the people. But in the last none years, when the country was faced with no real emergency, public rallies were arbitrarily and undemocratically banned, except for the illegal public rallies being held nation-wide by the Prime Minister.
In the first 25 years of Malaysia’s nationhood, the government leaders still paid lip-service to the multi-racial, multi-lingual, multi-cultural and multi-religious basis of Malaysia, but after the landslide electoral victory in the 1982 general elections, the Barisan Nasional officially proclaimed its ‘One Language, One Culture’ Policy, and started on the process of Islamisation in the various fields of national life – with the Prime Minister and other Ministers talking of an Islamic State for Malaysia in the distant future.
For 30 years, the politics of race had been used to perpetuate the class interests of both the privileged Malay elite and the wealthy non-Malays while the Malay and non-Malay poor remain at the bottom of the ladder, suffering in their poverty and deprivations.
Malaysia is faced with a multiple crisis of confidence
Malaysia is today faced with a multiple crisis of confidence, whether politically, economically, culturally or in the nation-building process itself.
The Malaysian Constitution had been amended over a thousand times and the various fundamental liberties enshrined in the Constitution had been nullified by so many arbitrary and draconian laws that these fundamental rights had become ‘fundamental wrongs’ of Malaysians.
The root cause of this national crisis of identity must be found in the traditional two-third parliamentary majority of the Barisan Nasional, and formerly the Alliance, which has bred in the ruling coalition an arrogance of power that it has become a tyranny of the majority which regarded itself as having the divine right to rule in Malaysia, as well as the divine right to have a two-third parliamentary majority.
The denial of the Barisan Nasional two-third parliamentary majority will be the first important step to make the government accountable and responsible to the voters, and the essential pre-condition for the restoration of democracy and halt the relentless erosion of human rights and fundamental liberties of Malaysians.
The denial of the Barisan Nasional two-third parliamentary majority will be the first important step to make the government accountable and responsible to the voters, and the essential pre-condition for the restoration of democracy and halt the relentless erosion of human rights and fundamental liberties of Malaysians.
It will start the process to give real meaning to the constitutional guarantees of fundamental liberties, for without a two-third parliamentary majority, the Barisan Nasional government would have to take into account the aspirations and rights of all communities and all sections of the people, and cannot ride roughshod over them as was the case up to now.
The Malaysian parliament would be totally different Parliament if there are sixty MPs, which is required to deny the Barisan two-third majority. It will be a forum of great excitement and interest, where the ruling government Ministers and Deputy Ministers would have to be constantly on their toes to justify and defend their every action, and not as now, where Parliament has been reduced to a rubber stamp of the Cabinet or the Prime Minister himself.
If the Barisan Nasional is deprived of its two-third Parliamentary majority in the next general elections, it would also serve as a warning that if it continues to disregard the basic rights and aspirations of the people, making the Constitution a meaningless document, then it could be voted out of power in the subsequent general elections.
If the Barisan Nasional had not won the landslide elections victory in 1982, causing the DAP the great electoral defeats, it would not have dared to proclaim the ‘One Language, One Culture’ Policy or embarked on as Islamisation policy, or in Malacca, the Malacca State Chief minister, Datuk Abdul Rahim Thamby Cik, would not have dared to work out a plan to try to demolish Bukit China for commercial development and profit.
The aim to deny the Barisan Nasional the two-third parliamentary majority must not only be the DAP’s objective, but must be the common aim of every Malaysian who want to see the reversal of the process of erosion of our citizenship rights, and it is for this reason that the DAP is launching the ‘Deny Barisan Nasional two-third parliamentary majority’ campaign to seek the support and open commitment of all like-minded Malaysians.
The DAP calls on Malaysians who share the same objective to commit themselves from now until the next general elections to play their part to achieve this objective. The DAP cannot promise them any financial or material struggle to regain our political rights and democratic freedoms, and to ensure that Malaysia steer away from the twin dangers of extremism of racialism and religious fanaticism.
I would urge Malaysians who want to be able to help determine the political destiny of our country to come forward to join in the DAP’s ‘Deny Barisan Nasional Two-Third Majority’ campaign, and not lose our basic citizenship rights by our own default.
For the objective of denying the Barisan Nasional two-third majority, the DAP is prepared to co-operate with PAS. Unfortunately, DAP’s overtures to PAS had been spurned, because PAS leaders have been convinced by certain Chinese community and Chinese educational group leaders into believing that the Chinese voters would now vote PAS even at the expense of the DAP. As a result, PAS believes that it is within reach of capturing national government in the next general elections, and to begin establishing its objective of an Islamic State.
PAS has actually fallen into the trap of those who wanted to use PAS to split votes and deny DAP victory in the constituencies we contest, s that eventually it is the Barisan Nasional candidates who would win. In the process, the Barisan Nasional hopes to preserve its two-third parliamentary majority.
I must admit that these people who are making use of PAS to try to split the DAP’s votes and ensure a Barisan Nasional victory are very ‘smart’ people. There are the same people who in the 1982 general elections, were responsible for the strategy of Tung Chiau Chung’ Attack into the Barisan to rectify the Barisan’. They succeeded in helping Barisan by causing the DAP to lose many of its parliamentary seats.
I do not think the PAS leaders are so naïve as to believe that they could win the Chinese voters and urban constituencies, but it does no harm if there are self-proclaimed Chinese leaders who are running round the country declaring that the PAS are now the only ‘saviors’ of the Chinese, and that they should reject the DAP and vote for PAS, or PAS-sponsored candidates.
In an Islamic State, non-Muslims would have no role to play in top policy-making in the country, and this is why non-Muslims will not be allowed to be Members of Parliament, State Assemblymen, Ministers, Prime Minister, top government officials or judges.
But in the struggle to destroy the Malaysian political system and the Malaysian Constitution, non-Muslims will be allowed to play their full part. But once the Islamic State and Constitution is established, then the non-Muslims will become the new second-class citizens in the country.
In the game being played by certain Chinese community and Chinese educational group leaders, supporting the PAS against the DAP, it will be the Malaysian Chinese who will be the losers in the short term as well as long term. In the short-term, it will save Barisan Nasional from losing its two-third majority in Parliament; while in the long term, the country will be launched in the direction of an Islamic State, with UMNO and PAS competing with each other as to who could achieve it first.
I call on all Malaysian voters to weigh carefully the important issues at stake in the coming general elections, and not to allow themselves to be ‘duped’ another time, as happened in the 1982 general elections and previously. All Malaysian voters, who cherish democratic, justice and the Malaysian nation as a homeland for all citizens regardless of race, should band together to deny Barisan Nasional its two-third majority. Only then can Malaysians have a new hope and a new future.