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Media Comment
by Ronnie Liu
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(Petaling Jaya, Tuesday) :  MCA leaders were crying foul when the Umno Youth deputy chief Khairy Jamaluddin attacked MCA and other BN component party leaders for "trying to fish in muddy water." Khairy accused MCA leaders for pushing for demands when Umno was weak (Khairy's accusation was unfounded as no MCA leaders has the guts to do so). But they soon dropped their demand for an apology from Khairy when both Hishamuddin Hussein and Khairy himself disagreed. Not only that, they were forced to agree with Umno Youth that they would hold internal meetings to explain the matter to their own members why they should not be unhappy with Khairy! MCA Youth chief Liow Teong Lai and secretary general Wee Kah Seong were not even allowed to open their mouths in the press conference chaired by Hisham. Malaysians who were unfamiliar with MCA politics were shocked to see that they were all looked like pussy-cats in front of their political masters. What a turn of event!

MCA leaders were crying foul again when the Umno Youth chief was caught brandishing his keris for the second time in the annual Umno Youth assembly. In reaction to this, Wee Kah Seong wrote in his column in Nanyang Siang Pau that Hisham should not have done so to hurt the feelings of the Non-Malays; he even asked Hisham "to whom the keris was pointing to?" But soon after the closed-door meeting with Hisham, they now accepted the explanation from Hisham that 'the keris is just a symbol" and he has no intention to use it on the Chinese. In another words, MCA Youth leaders are now saying that the brandishing of keris was nothing improper and unusual. They even turned their target at DAP Secretary General Lim Guan Eng, accusing Lim for smearing Hisham and the MCA!

MCA leaders are nothing but a bunch of cowards and great pretenders. Their leaders have no credibility to criticize Lee Kuan Yew when the mentor minister pointed out that the Chinese (and other non-Malays) were being marginalized systematically under the Umno rule.

MCA leaders have failed the Chinese community practically on every aspect of their lives. From mother-tongue education and higher education, cultural and religious rights, business and career opportunities, contracts and licenses… the MCA has always failed to speak up as if they have no more backbones!

I have recently proposed to some DAPSY leaders that they should challenge the MCA Youth leaders for an open debate on issues such as mother-tongue education and master-servant relationship between Umno and MCA. That way, they will not be able to hide behind media statements.

(My recent "war of words" over the issue of acute shortage of Chinese schools with the MCA leaders over the Internet portals like Malaysiakini and Merdekareview ended up with MCA writers hiding behind their own website! They dare not even publish their rebuttals over the se independent Internet portals!)

(12/12/2006)