The six state polls ended ten days ago but its results are still analysed by politicians, political scientists and Malaysians as a whole as to what it import for Malaysia – whether a Sheraton Move.2.0 could be tried to topple the Anwar unity government.
One political scientist says that the growing strength of PAS and DAP is rooted in multiple failures on the part of the centrist Barisan Nasional-led federal government since the 1990s, such as weak leadership, poor governance and corruption and that if the centrist leaders had performed, they would have held the centre.
I do not agree with such an analysis placing DAP at one extreme end of the political spectrum to PAS as the DAP is one of the centrist parties in Malaysia.
PAS President, Hadi Awang tried to place the DAP the other extreme end of the spectrum, alleging that the DAP is anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-Rulers, cause of May 13, 1969 riots n Kuala Lumpur and even communist, but he has not been able to come out with an iota of evidence to substantiate his wild and preposterous allegations.
DAP is a party for all Malaysians.
Right from the first general election contested by the DAP in 1969, we have a multi-racial representation in the Parliamentary and State Assembly candidates DAP fielded, and before the 1974 General Election, DAP announced that if DAP wins power in Perak, Ibrahim Singgeh would be a Perak Mentri Besar.
I was accused as anti-Chinese because the DAP fielded Ahmad Nor as the candidate in the Gopeng parliamentary by-election in 1987. But Ahmad Nor went on to become the first Malay Member of Parliament of DAP in 1990, and today, there are three Malay DAP Parliamentarians.
I congratulate the Bandar Utama State Assemblywoman Jamaliah Jamaluddin for being the first Malay DAP Exco in Selangor and as former Deputy Minister, Ong Kian Ming pointed out in his recent writing, DAP is capable of winning in Malay-majority seats and Sungei Pelek with almost 60% Malay majority seat is a good example.
We created the second Deputy Chief Minister’s post for Malaysian Indians in 2008 and DAP had C.V. Devan Nair as founding DAP Secretary-General and Karpal Singh as the third DAP National Chairman.
I call on young Malaysians, regardless of race, religion, politics or region to support the objective of Malaysia rising up again to be a world-class nation and avoid the fate of a divided, failed and corrupt state like Sri Lanka in the coming decades.