KUCHING, May 30- Sarawak Chief Minister Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud has given Kota Sentosa DAP assemblyman Chong Chieng Jen three months to apologise for uttering defamatory words against him.
Taib, who is also Sarawak Finance Minister as well as Resource Planning and Environment Minister, said today he would consider filing court proceedings against Chong unless he withdraws the defamatory allegations and duly apologise within the next three months.
“So long as there are Sarawakians like those in the opposition who persist in being willing tools for the dissemination of these false or exaggerated allegations, the state is at risk of becoming subservient to these foreign manipulators with potentially dire economic, social and political consequences,”he said in his winding-up speech in the Sarawak state legislative assembly here today.
He said the state had already institued legal action against Chong, who is also Sarawak DAP secretary, for defamation pertaining to what he said outside the August House on the state’s budgetary and financial system to cause considerable damage to the government’s reputation and integrity of its financial system.
In asking him to seriously reflect in the spirit of Sarawakian patriotism, Taib said, through his abrasive sytyle of politicking, the Kota Sentosa state assemblyman not only lowered the dignity of the august institution but also tried to create distrust among the people for those who had been legitimately given the mandate by the people to govern the state.
“By the manner he continuously articulated his argument inside and outside this august House, based on the allegations in the foreign media and promoted by foreign organisations, he malicously sought to achieve what he miserably failed to attain in the general election – to change the government,” Taib, who is also state Barisan Nasional (BN) chairman said.
Notwithstanding the electorate’s emphatic rejection of what was revealed in the Global Witness tapes, he said, DAP members, particularly Chong (photo) had continued to refer to them as if they contained the gospel truth.
He said in March this year, just before the recent parliamentary election, Global Witness, a London based organisation with links to Bruno Manser Fund and a foundation promoted by an internationally renowned currency speculator, broadcast video tapes on conversations between its hired ‘investigator’ Andrew Stewart, and some Sarawakians, including two of his cousins.
The opposition, especially the DAP had disseminated these tapes and their contents, which led to opinions being expressed by individuals about how land for plantations was alienated in Sarawak and the schemes by those who allegedly obtained such land to maximise quick profits and fraudulently avoided Malaysian tax, he said.
“Even a newly qualified lawyer would understand that such illicitly procuredevidence from unsuspecting third parties could not stand up to the basic standard of proof of guilt before a judicial tribunal against any person they were referring,” Taib said, adding the only interpretation of the results of the recently concluded parliamentary polls was that people of Sarawak overwhelming rejected the allegations made by Global Witness.
He said the state BN, led by himself, won 25 out of the 31 seats, which was more than two-thirds of the parliamentary seats in Sarawak while three opposition candidates, who were fond of making land grab allegations against the government and launched native customary rights land cases in court relating to plantation land failed by wide margins to be elected in Limbang, Lubok Antu and Sri Aman.
– BERNAMA
