Kit Siang : Will Wee Ka Siong apologise and demonstrate his contrition for being an “enabler of Najib kleptocracy” in the last three days of this year?

Datuk Seri Dr. Wee Ka Siong is the Datuk Seri Dr. Zahid Hamidi of MCA. At least when Zahid claims to represent the Malays, he can do so without batting an eyelid. Can Wee honestly and honourably claim to represent the Chinese, even in the Ayer Hitam parliamentary constituency? Wee is the sole MCA MP in Parliament. But who sent him to Parliament – the Chinese of Malaysia or UMNO’s Malay vote bank?

Would Wee have the political honour and integrity to immediately resign as MP for Ayer Hitam so that he could truly, honesty and honourably speak on behalf of the Chinese in Malaysia? Wee had been proud to be compared to Zahid, but not after Dec 18. At least Zahid had the political instinct to step aside as UMNO President and have his portrait taken down at the UMNO Supreme Council meeting room. Have Wee the political guts to do the same? Nobody have said it better than former MCA President, Datuk Seri Dr. Chua Soi Lek who had condemned the MCA Ministers for not speaking out on the 1MDB scandal when in government. He said the MCA leadership had five years and many opportunities to transform MCA, but he had seen no changes. As Chua said, winning the MCA party election is the easiest part, but the real challenge is on how to transform MCA into an effective Opposition party.so as to regain the support and confidence of the party members.

As I observed early this month, the MCA General Assembly after Wee was elected MCA President must be the most humiliating experience of the MCA in its 69-year history – worse than the 2103 General Election when it became a 7/11 political party, or the 2018 general election, when it degenerated into a mosquito party winning only one parliamentary seat. I said: “In the last two days, whatever is left of MCA pride and dignity were dragged over the coals by UMNO leaders, with Zahid reminding MCA to know its place; UMNO Deputy President Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan urging MCA to leave Barisan Nasional (BN) immediately, remarking that he would be ‘very thankful’ if MCA quits BN as ‘We cannot afford to have a burdensome friend when we are already having a tough time, politically’ while even the UMNO-owned Malay daily Utusan Malaysia also joined in the fray, lashing out at MCA for overstepping its authority, branding the party a ‘weakling’ and insignificant member of the former ruling coalition.

“But the most mortifying mistake of last Sunday’s MCA General Assembly was not the resolution that BN dissolves, but its craven and cowardly failure to repudiate former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak for the monstrous 1MDB corruption and money-laundering scandal which turned Malaysia into a global kleptocracy.” I concluded my remarks saying: “MCA can recover from the attacks of UMNO leaders, however legitimate and justified, but it can never recover from its craven and cowardly failure to repudiate Najib for the monstrous 1MDB scandal which brought to Malaysia to the international infamy, ignominy and iniquity of a global kleptocracy.” Yesterday, Wee said the 1MDB issue cannot be the DAP’s multi-purpose excuse to be exploited every time Pakatan Harapan runs into controversy.

Wee cannot be so naïve as not to know that this is not the case as the DAP will not run away from issues. DAP is not in competition with MCA’s record of spinelessness – to use politics for self-gain, whether titles, position or fortune. This is why in my response to Tan Sri Clement Hii’s FaceBook posting, I had said in Luoyang, Henan on 27th December that the DAP would never become a MCA2, as the DAP would have no hesitation in leaving the coalition government if the objective of a New Malaysia is abandoned. Have MCA in six decades made any such-like statement? This statement was not a threat or announcement of our quitting Pakatan Harapan, but a statement of our political principles and commitment. But petty and small-minded politicians like Wee twisted it into a statement of intent and accused me of making a U-turn when the DAP did not quit Pakatan Harapan.

I do not think the Malaysians can be so easily hook-winked. In fact, the majority of MCA members do not believe in Wee’s obsession with so-called “U-turns”! There can, however, be no doubt that Wee is one of the “enablers of Najib kleptocracy”. Having aided and abetted former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak in the monstrous 1MDB corruption and money-laundering scandal and the other 1MDB-like scandals in Felda, Felcra, Tabung Haji and MARA, is he prepared to apologise to all Malaysians in the last three days of this year so that he does not have to carry the cross of being an “enabler of Najib kleptocracy” into the new year of 2019? Wee has three days to make a clean breast of his past as an enabler of Najib kleptocracy, and to declare and demonstrate regret and contrition for not standing up to the crime of global kleptocracy and failing to defend the international honour, repute and standing of the nation.

What is Wee’s response?