Speech by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General, and MP for Tanjung, Lim Kit Siang, at the Perak DAP State Committee meeting on ‘Party Reform’ held at DAP Perak Hqrs, Ipoh on Monday, 23rd March, 1992 at 8pm.
If MCA Youth’s meeting with Dr. Mahathir is ‘historic’, then Dr. Ling Liong Sik’s tenure as MCA President must he a ‘historic failure’.
The MCA Youth’s meeting with the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Dr. Mahathir Mohamed, last Saturday was described as a ‘historic meeting’.
If this meeting was ‘historic’, then Dr. Ling Liong Sik’s tenure as MCA President can only be described as a ‘historic failure’!
Liong Sik and the other three MCA Ministers meet Dr. Maha¬thir at least once a week at Cabinet meetings, but they have not been able to make any progress on the various issues which the MCA Youth had raised with the Prime Minister.
Does the MCA Youth really want the country and people to believe that the MCA Youth had made progress on issues which the four MCA Ministers, who are respectively MCA President, Deputy President, Vice President and Secretary-General, had failed to do?
It would appear that the four MCA Ministers do not even represent the MCA and MCA Youth in
Cabinet and Government. Who really do Ling Liong Sik, Lee Kim Sai, Lim Ah Lek and Ting Chew
Peh represent who they are in Cabinet and Government?
DAP proposes a total boycott of TV 3 by MCA Ministers and leaders until it introduces Mandarin news.
MCA Youth had been calling on Chinese commercial firms to boycott TV 3 advertisements until it respects the wishes and rights of the Chinese community by introducing Mandarin news.
However, MCA and MCA Youth leaders themselves do not support this call for they compete to get coverage on TV 3 news and other programmes.
If MCA and MCA Youth are sincere and serious in their demand that TV 3 should introduce Mandarin news, then I suggest a total boycott of TV 3 by MCA leaders and MCA Youth leaders, including Ministers and Deputy Ministers.
Whenever TV 3 reporters appear at any function of the MCA Ministers and leaders, the TV 3 reporters and television crew should be politely told that they are not allowed to cover the event until TV3 has introduced Mandarin news programme.
DAP will join in this total boycott of TV3.
DAP calls, for establishment of a full Ministry of Environment to deal with the deterioration of the environment.
The latest report of the Department of Environment – 1990 annual report last week has highlighted the continued deterioration of the environment in Malaysia despite greater consciousness and concern about the importance of environmental protection.
Air and water quality had not improved from the previous years as seen from increasing pollutant levels detected.
High and increasing levels of oxides of sulphur and nitro¬gen, carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons continued to be released into the atmosphere.
Many beaches and coastal areas considered ‘tourist’ attrac¬tions were seriously contaminated. River water quality in 1990 deterioriated and out of 90 rivers monitored, seven were seriously pollut¬ed.
Although the Department of Environment (DOE) has now a very high public profile, with either the Minister or Deputy Minister or an official of the DOE getting into the press almost daily, the government’s efforts to check environmental degradation in the country still lack seriousness, direction, clout and power.
As a first step to deal with the deterioration of the environment, DAP calls for the establishment of a
full Ministry of Environment to single-mindedly spearhead the battle to protect the environment.
Last year, the Minister for Science Technology and Envi¬ronment, Law Hieng Ding, said that the government was reviewing the 25 laws related to environment and that amendments to the Environmental Quality Act would be tabled in Dewan Rakyat early this year so that the Department of Environment can be more effective to check the destruction of the environment.
In view of the Earth Summit in Brazil in June, the Govern¬ment should aim to present comprehensive proposals to Parliament when it meets in April, both in terms of new legislative measures as well as a National Environment Policy to demonstrate the government’s new resolve on the environmental front.