Speech

at the DAP 40^th anniversary dinner organized by Pekan Lukut branch

by Loke Siew Fook

(Lukut, Saturday): The victory of DAP Sarawak in winning an unprecedented 6 state seats at last week’s Sarawak state election has not only sent a strong political message to the Barisan Nasional about the dissatisfactions of the people towards the government but it has boosted the morale and motivation of all DAP leaders and members nationwide to strive for greater heights in our political journey.

The emergence of a strong opposition presence in the new Sarawak State Legislative Assembly is the best testimony of a poor mid-term report card of the Pak Lah’s administration. Although Pak Lah had promised the “skies” to Malaysians in the campaign of the 2004 general election about the many reform-orientated programs in particular the fight against corruption and reforming public delivery system, nothing much in concrete has materialized in the last 2 years. The slow pace in Pak Lah’s reform program or rather the non-existence of it is perhaps the most important contributing factor to the poor showing of Barisan Nasional in the just concluded Sarawak state election.

The coming years will be very challenging for all Malaysians as all of us are facing an increasingly higher cost of living and worst still, the many recent decisions by the government in particular raising the fuel price and the electricity tariff are contributing to an estimated 4% in inflation. The government said that all these decisions are unavoidable as the world oil price is beyond the control of the BN government. Malaysians are not convinced at all with this argument. Higher oil price has actually increased the profits of Petronas which in turn means higher revenue for the federal government. What is lacking is the transparency of Petronas in which nobody actually knows how Petronas’s monies are being used. Even our former Prime Minister and adviser to Petronas, Tun Dr. Mahathir has called on the government to be more transparent on Petronas.

The problem in Malaysia is not that we are lack of natural resources nor our economy is not growing. The problem with Malaysia is that too much public monies and resources are wasted due to government leakages, corruptions in all levels of government and misallocation of public funds on unproductive projects and expenditure. The only way for Malaysians to heal these many ills in our system of governance is to have a strong opposition presence in the Parliament and all state assemblies.

DAP Negeri Sembilan are working very hard to strive for a bigger breakthrough in the next general election in particular wresting at least one parliamentary seat and six additional state seats. This target is achievable and DAP NS is moving towards this direction. The breakthrough in the 2004 general election in wresting back Lobak and Bahau state seats was the most important milestone in rebuilding DAP NS after a decade of political doldrums. I wish to announce that the launching of the “DAP Negeri Sembilan’s building Fund” tonight to target to raise RM350,000.00 in the next 12 months is another major milestone for the reemergence of a strong DAP’s presence in Negeri Sembilan. I’m very glad that we had a great start in this fundraising campaign as we already raised RM25,000 tonight – RM10,000 by Seremban branch, RM10,000 by Sdr. Lee Kong Hing and RM5,000 by Rantau Timur branch. I appeal to all DAP supporters in the state to help us to make this very important project a reality for a stronger DAP in the state.