Author: Curator

DAP’s Rural Drive

Extracts of speech by DAP Secretary-General, Mr Lim Kit Siang, at the inaugural meeting of the National DAP Rural Oganisation Sub-committee held at the DAP Headquarters in Petaling Jaya on Sunday, 8th August 1971 at 10am

DAP’s Rural Drive

The DAP is now embarked on the second phase of its party programme. This is the organization of the rural areas.

The task of organizing the party in the rural areas is any times more difficult than the organization of the urban areas. In the rural areas, we are going to encounter many obstacles, for instance, the use by UMNO of religion to buttress their political influence.

In the long run, however, the arguments of class and economics, of poverty and exploitation, must prevail over the misuse of religion for political ends. Continue reading DAP’s Rural Drive

Public Rallies, DAP-MCA secret talks & Parliament

Speech by DAP Secretary-General and Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr Lim Kit Siang, at the DAP Public Rally at Bandar Hilir Padang, Malacca, on Sunday, 1st August 1971 at 8pm

Public Rallies

This is not the first DAP public rally in Malacca after the 1969 General Elections, but the second one.

The people of Malacca will remember that two days after polling day, on May 12, 1969, the DAP held a victory rally at this very padang after a victory and thank-the-voters procession round the town the same afternoon. Continue reading Public Rallies, DAP-MCA secret talks & Parliament

Hamid Tuah and landlessness

Speech by DAP Secretary-General, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at the general meeting of the Kuala Klawang DAP Branch at 3 p.m. on Saturday, 31st July 1971 in Negri Sembilan

Hamid Tuah and landlessness

In Parliament yesterday, the Minister for National and Rural Development, Inche Ghafar Baba, in attempting to justify the detention of peasant leader, Hamid Tuah, under the Internal Security Act, said that the government could not allow people to open up land without government permission.

He said: “If this were allowed, only the rich would become richer. The poor could only open up land with their bare hands whereas the rich could clear vast areas in no time because they had money.” Continue reading Hamid Tuah and landlessness

Chinese Medical School

Speech by DAP Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, in the Dewan Ra’ayat on the Medical Bill on 29th July 1971

Chinese Medical School

I wish to make a proposal with regard to the problem of shortage of doctors which this Bill is partly trying to solve.

As my colleague from Seremban Timor, Dr. Chen Man Hin, said yesterday, the People’s Republic of China has very successfully married the Western and the traditional Chinese medicine.

American and Canadian medical experts have reported of operations, including heart operations, without anaesthetios, but by the use of acupuncture which they had personally witnessed. Continue reading Chinese Medical School

Tun Razak’s Parliament Statement on China

Tun Razak’s Parliament Statement on China

In his Ministerial foreign policy statement in parliament yesterday, the Prime Minister, Tun Abdul Razak, said:

“On the bilateral level, our relations with China at present will be at the unofficial level dealing with trade matters. The question of establishing diplomatic relations will have to be considered as a separate matter at a later date.”

This is where the DAP disagrees with the government’s policy on China. Continue reading Tun Razak’s Parliament Statement on China

Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill 1971

Speech by Sdr. Lim Kit Siang on the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill 1971 in the Dewan Rakyat on July 26, 1971.

Sir, the problem of corruption has been raised many times in this House and now we have this Amendment Bill. This is as it should be, because corruption is not only the national cancer eating away the vitals of economic development in our country, it is the cause of the people’s lack of confidence in the honesty and integrity of the Government leaders and administrators. The Government has made ostentations propaganda and display of its efforts to prevent corruption, but this has only increased public cynicism about the Governments anti-corruption measures because they do not have any actual curb or elimination of corruption in high places. Unless efforts are directed towards punishing corruption of those higher ups, as higher officials, political leaders, big bribers in the business class, the disease of corruption all the way down to pretty bribery will be protected. All that the Anti-Corruption Agency has done is to catch the small frys, by prosecuting and punishing a few lower-bracket officials. But the sharks, the ikan yus, have all been untouched. Continue reading Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill 1971

Industrial Relations (Amendment) Bill 1971

Speech by Sdr. Lim Kit Siang on the Industrial Relations (Amendment) Bill 1971 in the Dewan Rakyat on July 26, 1971.

When the Industrial Relations Bill was presented to the Dewan Ra’ayat in 1967, my party said that the Bill, when enacted into law, would bring bind the workers hand and foot.

The industrial Relations Act, 1967, is detrimental to the interest of the workers as it flagrantly flouts the rights of Malaysian workers, Workers, especially unorganised workers who comprise 90 per cent of the total work-force, and small and weak unions are left completely at the tender mercy of anti-union employers and a far from sympathetic Ministers of Labour. Continue reading Industrial Relations (Amendment) Bill 1971

Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill 1971

Speech by Sdr. Lim Kit Siang on the Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill 1971, in the Dewan Rakyat on July 26, 1971

Mr. Speaker, Sir, this is another piece of anti-labour legislation. The most “eye-catching” amendment is the provision banding trade union leaders from holding office in political parties. No other Act, I submit, of the Alliance Government has done more to show its mistrust and suspicion, even bordering on hatred, of the workers. Year in and year out the Government, through this Parliament, enacts more and more restrictive, oppressive and anti labour laws. The only way workers can undo all these anti-labour legislation is to send their leaders to this Parliament to battle for the legitimate rights of the workers, to release the workers from the bondage which the Government has condemned them to.

There was a time when trade unions and their leaders held the view that trade unions have nothing to do with politics. I am happy that this attitude has changed, because that belief was self- defeating and fallacious. For politics concerns every aspect of our life; whether it be cost of living, security of jobs, human and decent wages or human conditions of work. In Malaysia, workers have begun to realize that in a democratic country the only way to break the chains of these repressive, restrictive and anti-labour laws, which the Government has imposed on them, is to send their leaders to Parliament the supreme law-making body, to champion their rights and oppose the avaricious greed of those capitalists who will want even to squeeze blood from stone. Continue reading Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill 1971

Corruption in Malaysia

Speech by DAP Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, on the 1961 Prevention of Corruption Act Amendment Bill in the Dewan Ra’ayat on July 26, 1971

Corruption in Malaysia

The problem of corruption has been raised many times in this House. This is as it should be, because corruption is not only the national cancer eating away the vitals of economic development in our country, it is the cause of the people’s lack of confidence in the honesty and integrity of the government leaders and administrators.

The government has made ostentatious propaganda and display of its efforts to prevent corruption, but this has only increased public cynicism about the government’s anti-corruption measures because they do not see any actual curb or elimination of corruption. Continue reading Corruption in Malaysia

Reply to Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen

Statement by DAP Member f Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr.Lim Kit Siang, at a press conference in Malacca on Saturday, 24th July 1971.

Reply to Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen

The Assistant Minister of Defence, Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen bin Tengku Ismail, said in Parliament two days ago that the DAP had questioned the Five-Power Defence Agreement without giving any constructive views.

Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen has only himself to blame for this, for if he has been more patient, he would have heard my proposals about the proper defence strategy and structure for Malaysia. Unfortunately, he and his government front-bench colleagues would not allow me to do so. Continue reading Reply to Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen