Press Conference Statement (3) by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tanjung, Lim Kit Siang, at DAP PJ Hqrs on Thursday, 26th April 1990 at 11.30 a.m.
DAP refutes Liong Sik’s allegation that DAP is engineering MCA disunity
I refute the allegation by the MCA President, Datuk Dr. Ling Liong Sik, after the MCA Central Committee meeting on Tuesday that the DAP is out to engineer MCA disunity and internal party split.
The DAP has more important things to do than to waste out time to engineer internal party split in MCA, now that we have added responsibility after ‘adopting’ the four MCA Ministers and their MCA party positions.
Recently, there has been a spate of press reports about the worsening relationship between the MCA President, Datuk Dr. Ling Liong Sik, and the MCA Deputy President, Datuk Lee Kim Sai, and their respective factions, which had been fed by the following:
1. the intensification of the power struggle between the Liong Sik and Kim Sai factions in teh branch elections and at the divisional and state levels;
2. refusal by Kim Sai to firmly and categorically declare that he would not contest for the MCA Presidency, as seen by his refusal to state his stand when asked by the press on 22nd April 1990 as to what he would do if there are nominations for him for the post of MCA President for the July MCA party elections.
3. the intriguing statement by Lee Kim Sai on the same day that he could not support Datuk Dr. Ling Liong Sik as MCA President should he one day become ‘the rat running across the street’, which reserves a back-route open for Kim Sai to contest against Liong Sik one day should he decide to do so.
4. the convenient ‘amnesia’ by Kim Sai about the MCA Crescent Bay Pact presided over by prisoner Tan Koon Swan, whereby Liong Sik agreed to serve only for one term as MCA President and to give away to Kim Sai, in return for which Kim Sai pledged his loyalty to Liong Sik. The significance of this ‘amnesia’ is that Kim Sai has refused to deny that there is such a MCA Crescent Bay Pact!
I refute Liong Sik’s allegation that the DAP is behind the internal turmoil in MCA, unless the MCA President is suggesting that the DAP is responsible for masterminding the intense power struggles and state levels in the MCA; or that I had advised Kim Sai not to write off the possibility of having to contest for the MCA Presidency in the July MCA party elections, or to use the highly derogatory term of “rat running across the street” on Liong Sik, or to claim “amnesia” about the MCA Crescent Bay Pact!
Everyone in the MCA knows that Liong Sik was virtually the “rat running across the street” both inside the MCA and outside, in the KSM-MPHB Investment Fund issue, where the DAP had to force the MCA leadership to adopt the DAP proposals for the best interest of the 50, 398 members who are unitholders.
Surely, Liong Sik cannot claim that I was the ‘secret hand’ behind the emergency top MCA leadership meeting of the four MCA Ministers on March 29, two days after the ‘Two Lims Meeting’ at the MCA Headquarters, where Liong Sik was outvoted by 3 voters to 1, abandoning Liong Sik’s proposal and accepting the DAP formula, leading to Kim Sai announcing at a press conference later the three-point MCA formula for the KSM-MPHB Investment Fund issue?
Again, Liong Sik cannot mean that DAP is responsible for the widespread lack of confidence among MCA members in his leadership, especially in his failure to give satisfactory explanation for the appointment of David Yeoh as Senator; the take-over of KSM’s 29.8 per cent stake of MPHB by Kamunting instead of by other interested companies; whether there was an astronomical donation given to a MCA official since May last year, and a whole series of other questions.
When the DAP announced the ‘adoption’ of the four MCA Ministers and their MCA party positions (to thank the MCA for ‘adopting’ DAP parliamentary constituencies), our intention was to advise and guide the four MCA Ministers to effectively and responsibly discharge their Ministerial duties and party responsibilities.
The DAP is definitely not interested in getting involved in the internal power struggle of MCA. However, if Liong Sik has any specific complaints that any DAP leader is involved in the factional fights in the MCA, he should give me the evidence, and I will investigate.