Press Statement (2) by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary- General and MP for Kota Melaka, Lim Kit Siang, in Petaling Jaya on Friday, 30.5.1986:
Tan Tiong Hong should stop being a ‘cat crying because of mouse’ over the Susie Teoh Case
MCA Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Dr. Tan Tiong Hong, should stop being a ‘cat crying because of mouse’ over the Susie Teoh case.
From Dr. Tan’s statements, it would appear that the Susie Teoh case is the first case where parents have lost their daughter because of forced conversion to Islam. In actual fact, the many other cases like Ng Yee Kuan in Kota Bahru, Tang Yu Fong in Sitiawan, as well as other cases in Selangor, Kedah, Pahang, Malacca had been brought to the MCA leaders in the first instance, but hey refused to render any help.
Even in the Susie Teoh case, has Dr. Tan gone to see the Home Monister, Datuk Seri Dr. Mahathir Mohamed, to find out why in our country a 17-year 8 month girl could disappear altogether although we have a big police and security force?
Dr. Tan is not really interested in Susie Teoh’s welfare or the sufferings of Teoh Eng Huat and his family over the loss of his daughter. While proclaiming that he does not want to introduce politics into the issue, Dr. Tan’s action is entirely politically-motivated.
Dr. Tan suggests that I am trying to politicize the Susie Teoh case, and even said that he had been a ‘victim’ of my ppolitics. Firstly, let me declare that the erosion of the people’s rights, whether political, economic, education, social or cultural, or now, the erosion of the rights of parents to the custody of their children, stems from political developments.
If Dr. Tan can argue that the Susie Teoh case has nothing to do with politics, then he could similarly argue that the Merdeka University case, the Section 21(2) of 1961 Education Act, the One Language-One Culture Policy have all no connection with politics. Dr. Tan and the MCA had misled the Malaysian Chinese for too long, and they should stop their politics of deception.
I do not really know what Dr. Tan meant when he said that he was once a victim of my politics. I presume he must be referring to his ‘longkang’ incident in the Raub by-election, where by he tried to make political capital from his own falling into a drain, accusing me of instigating DA members for pushing him into the drain. But the people of Simpalek New Village and Raub know Dr. Tan was lying, and there were photographs on record as well.
After the ‘longkang’ incident, he would go about Raub limping on a tongkat, except that he forgot which foot shoul be injured, and was photographed limping on different foot when going in and coming out of Simpalek New Village MCA premises.
I asked Dr. Tan in Parliament a few months ago why he could not remember which foot was injured in the drain incident. Datuk Dr. Tan had the check to answer that both feet were injured.
Why MCA Minister, Ling Liong Sik, have to go through so protracted ‘labour pains’ on the Bukit China quit rent issue?
Deputy MCA President and Transport Minister, Datuk Dr. Ling Liong Sik, has again declined to give details as to whether Bukit China quit rent in future is still payable, and again excluded the non-Chinese press from his press conference statement on Bukit China.
The Malaysian people, in particular the Malaysian Chinese, are really baffled why the MCA, and in particular its Deputy President, seen to go through such protracted ‘labour pains’ to resolve a simple issue, which is to get the Malacca China. If a simple issue like this requires such prolonged labour pains, what else could the MCA do?