By Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tanjong, Lim Kit Siang, in Petaling Jaya on Monday, July 5, 1993:
Kit Siang renews invitation to Ling Sik and Keng Yaik for a trip to Kota Bahru for a public beer
At his press conference yesterday, Gerakan President and Minister for Primary Industiesm Datuk Dr.Lim Keng Yaik said the DAP must ne held responsible for the PAS-led Kelantan State Government regulation restricting public sale and consumption of alcohol from July 1.
It is only to be expected that Keng Yaik would make such illogical and baseless allegations, as that the DAP is responsible for putting PAS into power in Kelantan State in the last general elections.
Keng Yaik knows fully well that the Chinese represent less than five per cent of the population in Kelantan, and that they could not, on their own, influence the result of any one of the 39 state assembly seats in the state. This meant that even if all the Chinese and non-Muslim votes had voted for the Barisan Nasionl in Kelantan in 1990, the result in Kelantan State would still be 39 to 0 in the State Assembly elections with UMNo not winning a single seat.
This fact and reality, however, does not prevent Keng Yaik from spreading the falsehood that the DAP is singly responsible for putting PAS into power in Kelantan State!
Keng Yaik referred to my invitation to him and the MCA President, Datuk Dr.Ling Liong Sik, in Jabuary 1992 to jointly make a trip to Kelantan to publicly drink beer.
At that time, MCA and Gerakan leaders were going up and down the country declaring that the Chinese in Kelantan were ‘oppressed’ and ‘persecuted’ by the Islamisation measures of the Kelantan State Government, claiming that the Chinese in Kelantan could not drink beer publicly.
At the meeting with the Kelantan Mentri Besar, Nik Aziz Nik Mat on January 28, 1992, DAP leaders raised the issue of the public sale and consumption of alcohol concerning non-Muslims, and the Kelantan Mentri Besar assured us that the status quo would be maintained.
MCA and Gerakan leades, including Cabinet Ministers, were telling untruths in early 1992 when they said that the Chinese in Kelantan were prohobited from drinking beer in public.
The situation has now changed with the violation of the undertaking of the Kelantan Mentri Besar to the DAP leaders in January 1992 and the announcement of the new regulations coming into effect from July 1 restricting public sale and consumption of alcohol affecting non-Muslims.
As a result, DAPSY with the full support of the DAP has decided to take legal action to challenge the new regulations affecting the public sale and consumption of alcohol affecting non-Muslims in Kelantan.