Media statement by Lim Guan Eng in DAP HQ in Petaling Jaya on Monday, 16^th August 2010: 

MCA, UMNO or even Perkasa would have no need to quarrel over the NEP and the 30% Bumi corporate equity requirement if a Royal Commission of Inquiry is set up to determine how RM52 billion of shares meant for Malay/Bumis were hijacked by the few BN leaders 

MCA, UMNO or even Perkasa would have no need to quarrel over the 30% bumi corporate equity requirement if a Royal Commission of Inquiry is set up to determine how RM 52 billion of shares meant for Malay/Bumis were hijacked by the few BN leaders. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak had admitted that of the RM 54 billion in bumi shares given out since the New Economic Policy(NEP) was launched in 1970, only RM 2 billion remained in bumi hands.

Clearly the RM 52 billion worth of shares given to the few Malay/bumi leaders were cashed out and sold off. Stern action and the full force of the law should be unleashed at this open sabotage of the NEP. If the RM 52 billion worth of bumi shares still remained in bumi hands, then the 30% bumi/Malay equity target under the NEP would have long been achieved.

What is surprising is the reluctance by MCA, UMNO or even Perkasa to address this important issue of a monstrous hijack of RM 52 billion worth of bumi shares. All of them have failed to call for action against these saboteurs of the NEP. In Parliament all BN MPs have refused to support DAP's call for a Royal Commission Enquiry to act against these saboteurs and compel them to cough up and return RM 52 billion back to the government to be redistributed to poor Malays/bumis.

Of the RM 54 billion bumi/Malay shares given, how many ordinary Malays got them? Every time this question is posed to ordinary Malays in the streets, the answer is always no. All Malaysians know the the RM 54 billion bumi shares are given to the cronies of UMNO or BN component parties.

BN's refusal to take action against these NEP saboteurs and that they return the RM 52 billion is an immoral act designed to protect their own cronies who have profited shamelessly from a policy that is supposed to assist the poor Malays/bumis.

So long as BN government refuses to demand full accountability and action over the "lost" RM 52 billion in bumi shares, they are using the NEP to divide and rule by playing racial antagonism against Malaysians. Clearly racial polemics over the NEP benefits BN to distract attention from the real problems Malaysians face. The real problems for Malaysia are not BN's claims of race or religion but deep-seated corruption, inefficiency, abuse of power, mediocrity and lack of rule of law.

*Lim Guan Eng, DAP Secretary General & Penang Chief Minister