PETALING JAYA, May 18- DAP stalwart Lim Kit Siang today said he would move a motion once Parliament convenes to censure Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi for his “arrogant and insufferable outburst”.
He was referring to the Umno vice-president’s call yesterday for Malaysians unhappy with the country’s political system to emigrate from the country.
“I invite MPs who wish to join me in co-sponsoring the censure motion against Zahid to email me their agreement so that a censure motion carrying the most number of signatures of MPs in a Malaysian parliamentary history could be submitted…
“I also invite them to suggest a draft of the censure motions against Zahid, which I would put in the public domain to invite public views and feedback,” said the Gelang Patah MP in a statement.
He also welcomed MPs from the Barisan Nasional to co-sponsor the motion, stressing that Ahmad Zahid’s “deplorable sentiments” must be condemned by all MPs and citizens regardless of party affiliation.
“[But] I do not know whether there would be anyone from BN who will be prepared to cross party lines to take a common stand in the interests of the Malaysian people and nation,” he added.
‘Khairy acting like old-time ministers’
Lim zeroed in on Sports and Youth Minister Khairy Jamaluddin’s reported explanation today that the statement was Ahmad Zahid’s “personal opinion”.
“How does Khairy know that Zahid’s disgraceful statement does not reflect the BN government’s position?
“Has Khairy been assured by the prime minister or deputy prime minister that the new cabinet would repudiate Zahid’s statement with a formal announcement?” he asked.
He noted that just 24 hours after being sworn into the Cabinet, Khairy had already started to “compromise his principles and begun to behave like old-time ministers”.
These old-timers, Lim said, were more interested in protecting their own turfs instead of taking a principled stand against “gross abuses of power and blatant injustices like Zahid’s outburst”.
“Will Khairy take the initiative at his first cabinet meeting to propose that the cabinet should distance itself and repudiate Zahid’s statement?” he asked.
‘Zahid should leave Malaysia’
Turning the tables on Ahmad Zahid, Lim stressed that if the home minister and others like-minded were unhappy Malaysians were demanding for a change to a clean, free and just electoral system, they were free to leave the country.
“But what should be of concern is the arrogance and contempt for public opinion of a minister in a government whose legitimacy is under a cloud for the first time in the nation’s history,” added Lim.
“One would have thought that in such circumstances of swirling clouds about their legitimacy, the ministers would be humble, approachable and sensitive to the aspirations of Malaysians.
“Instead, we see the arrogance and contempt of public opinion displayed by Zahid, one of the senior ministers of Najib’s cabinet after the 13GE,” he said.
In a comment piece published in yesterday’s Utusan Malaysia, Zahid had wrote: “Leaders of the opposition, particularly PKR and DAP, have confused Chinese youths and politically blind followers to dress in black as a sign of protest towards the general election 2013 results which they say favour them based on popular votes.”
“If these groups wish to use the list system of single transferable vote system used by republican countries, they should emigrate to those countries to practice their political beliefs.”
Lim today quipped: “Zahid deserves universal condemnation for his arrogant outburst, which is completely at variance with Najib’s signature policy of 1Malaysia and ‘People First’ (as Zahid’s outburst could only mean ‘Zahid or Umno First’) and against the grain of over five decades of nation-building of a plural Malaysia.”
