Speech During The DAP Forum on Ethnic Relations

by Lim Guan Eng

(Petaling Jaya, Sunday): The Kampung Medan incident in 2001 is a Malaysian tragedy that requires a national solution by the government but the MIC has committed the grave offence of reducing it to an Indian problem. By refusing to apologise or take action against the director of MIC’s think-thank Yayasan Strategik Social(YSS), Dr Denison Jayasooria, for his heretical and false premise in blaming Indian youths as one of the six causes of the Kampung Medan incident, MIC has betrayed the interests of the very community they claim to represent.

The issue is now no longer about Dr Denison Jayasooria. Even if Denison apologises or retracts  the damage is done. To date, he has stubbornly refused to apologise or retract his contemptible views. All he said is that it was not the sole cause but one of the six reasons for the Kampung Medan incident.

Even if these were one of the 6 causes of the Kampung Medan incident, it is wrong and an injustice to those who died or were injured. Do not turn the victims into culprits, which is what Dr Jayasooria has done. For such outrage, he will be judged by his community and his name remembered always as a reminder of how grievous the wound if done by one of your own flesh and blood.

The issue is no longer about Dr Jayasooria but about MIC and its defiant defence of Dr Jayasooria even though his views were obviously wrong and rejected by the Indian community. For refusing to admit that Dr Jayasooria was wrong, direct him to withdraw and apologise, as well as sack him from the YSS, the MIC has condemned those who died and injured in Kampung Medan to a grave injustice. 

MIC and its President Datuk S. Samy Vellu should apologise to the Indian community for holding on to Dr Jayasooria’s views that “the Malay community was distressed with the anti-social behaviour of a group of Indian youths in Kampung Medan, resulting in them wanting to teach the Indian youths a lesson”. Nothing justifies murder except in self-defence or another from grievous harm.

To date, there has been no White Paper on the incident. There has been no compensation for those injured. There has been no full inquiry to ensure that those responsible are fully punished. This is about justice for the victims of Kampung Medan.

Ethnic relations amongst the diverse races in Malaysia would never improve and racial harmony remain an unrealized dream as long as the government continues to blame non-Muslims for every thing that goes wrong and perpetuate the idea of ketuanan Melayu. Our children are required to learn about ketuanan Melayu in history books from Form 3 onwards. Does promoting racial supremacy helps to achieve national unity?

What is sadder and more regrettable is the refusal of the BN component parties like MCA, MIC, Gerakan and SUPP to correct such dangerous and wrong ideology. Such BN parties may accept being accorded second class citizen status but we who are gathered here today continue to hold fast to our social contract enshrined in the 1957 Merdeka Constitution of first-class citizenry with equal political and socio-economic rights.

So long as we support BN parties that are subservient and accept discrimination, the controversy surrounding the Ethnic Relations guidebook by University Putra Malaysia(UPM) will be repeated. History books that our children are taught is a mere reflection of the political reality that we helped to create. If we want historical accuracy, then it is important that political situation existing now reflects that desire.

Only by supporting parties that accept nothing less than equal first-class citizenship can we preserve our rights and dignity as Malaysians. Remember when opposition parties such as the DAP was strong, we never faced such controversies as historical errors in university and secondary history books. It is only now that our children are now taught lies to accept ketuanan Melayu, Suqiu is an extremist organization, DAP caused May 13 tragedy and the Indian youths were one of the causes of the Kampung Medan incident.

Let us therefore gather to show our protest against this grave injustice to fellow Malaysians who died or were injured but also carry back our determination to ensure that those who commit such injustices must be severely punished at the next elections.     

This forum is not about Dr Jayasooria alone but everything about MIC’s failure to fight for truth, democracy, freedom, justice and integrity. For those who wants to see real changes so that all Malaysians can live with human dignity, let me quote from Mahatma Gandhi,        

“You must be the change you want to see in the world.”

(06/08/2006)