by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tan Jung, Lim Kit Slang, in Penang on Thursday, 15th July, 1993:
Liong Sik should cancel the mammoth MCA public drinking party in Kota Bahru thru on August 6 and instead take up my invitation to a ‘Three Lira’ public beer drinking party instead MCA Secretary-General, Dr. Ting Chew Pen said yesterday that the MCA leadership does not encourage alcoholism but gives its approval to the mamrnoth MCA public drinking party in Kota Bahru on August 6.
I do not think the organising of a mammoth public drinking party by MCA in Kota Bahru on August 6 is the best way to oppose the new Kelantan State Government regulation restricting the public sale and. consumption of alcohol affecting non-Muslim Malaysians, for it will definitely give the impression that the Chinese community represented by the MCA are hard and heavy drinkers, if not alcoholics.
My proposal for a ‘Three Lim’ public beer-drinking party is definitely a better idea than the mammoth MCA public drinking party on August 6.
I must thank the Gerakan President, Datuk Dr. Lim Kerig Yaik for the idea to renew my invitation to the MCA President, Datuk Dr. Ling Liong Sik and to him to join me in a trip to Kota Bahru to drink beer publicly to challenge the new Kelantan regulations.
The invitation for a ‘Three Lim public beer-drinking’ session, involving a few people, will avoid the impression that the Chinese in Malaysia are all alcholics which would be created by a mammoth MCA public drinking party on August 6.
What type of impression does the MCA leaders want, to create not only for the Muslims and non-Muslims in Kelantan, but in Malaysia and internationally, where the Chinese with less than five per cent of the population in Kelantan is organising the most mammoth public drinking party in the whole country under the auspices of MCA?
Secondly, just because the Kelantan State Government had not been sensitive to the rights and sensitivities of the non-Muslims with the new regulations restricting the public sale and consumption of alcohol affecting non-Muslims, it does not mean that non-Muslim political leaders should be equally numb to sensitivities of the Muslims – as in organising a mammoth MCA public drinking party on August 6.
The PAS-led Kelantan State Government must take full responsibility if anything untoward should happen in •connection with the mammoth MCA public drinking party in Kota Bahru on August 6
A ‘Three Lim’ public beer drinking party, which would be a very small group, would avoid the impression that there is any move to mobilise arid encourage non-Muslims to publicly drink alcohol in public, whether in Kelantan or elsewhere in Malaysia.
Furthermore, with a ‘Three Lim” public beer-drinking party, there is no need to mobilise the public to drink alcohol publicly, and the political leaders of the three political parties are showing the example that they will fully represent the people in Kelantan and Malaysia in their common stand to challenge the new Kelantan regulation.
I therefore propose that Liong Sik should cancel the proposed MCA mammoth public drinking party in Kota Bahru on August 6 and instead accept the invitation to a ‘Three Lims’ public beer-drinking session in Kelantan. This will also show that political leaders will be in the very forefront, to challenge unfair and unjust regulations and laws, and not stay at the rear while egging the ordinary public to be in the frontline.
However, although I do not fully agree with the mammoth MCA public drinking party in Kota Bahru on August 6, the PAS Kelantan State Government must be fully warned that it must take full responsibility if anything untoward should happen in connection with the mammoth MCA public drinking party in Kota Bahru on August 6.