TTF: The MCA’s previous leadership was weak and incapacitated to withstand the DAP’s relentless attacks against Barisan Nasional and UMNO.
Its president, Dato’ Seri Liow Tiong Lai, was subservient to the whims of certain MCA life members – the likes of Tun Ling Liong Sik and Chan Kong Choy – and the heads of several Chinese clans, associations and temples.
These ‘taikos’ carried a lot of clout in the way the party was run and virtually told Liow what to do and say.
The new leadership, on the other hand, was given a mandate by delegates to lead the MCA at a time the party was still a component member of Barisan Nasional.
Although Dato’ Seri Wee Ka Siong may have promised delegates to review the party’s ties with UMNO, the fact that they voted him in does not translate to a memorandum against the party’s continued existence in Barisan.
The MCA’s departure could well translate into a sign of weakness, in that the new leadership would demonstrate to both the DAP and the Chinese that the party is not capable of finding middle ground with the Malays.
The DAP will call it an act of cowardice.
The MCA must ask itself if the Chinese are going to listen to the DAP and view the party’s departure from Barisan to be a sign that the Chinese and Malays were split by it.
There is no doubt in my mind that the DAP will pull at that thread.
The MCA should instead emulate the spirit its founding fathers embraced when seeking middle ground with the late Tunku Abdul Rahman.
Regardless what the history books say, i.e., whether or not that spirit was spawn of a prodigious desire by the late Tan Cheng Lok to protect Chinese wealth from seeping into the coffers of the colonial masters or the rulers, it is the spirit that counts, not how it got there.
So stay put in Barisan Nasional and lead the Chinese closer to the Malays.
Lead by example, not through cowardice.
KUALA LUMPUR: MCA will decide at its annual general assembly tomorrow on whether the party will remain or quit Barisan Nasional (BN) or push for the coalition’s dissolution, said MCA deputy president Datuk Dr Mah Hang Soon.
He said the Chinese community opines that MCA should leave BN even though MCA, as a founding partner of BN, has stand together through “thick and thin” with UMNO and MIC since independence.
“At a time when BN is at its weakest point after an unprecedented heavy defeat in the 14th General Election (GE14), questions arise whether MCA should leave BN or to request for the dissolution of BN through MCA’s position as a founding member of BN… this is the choice MCA members have to decide for the future,” he said when officiating the MCA Youth annual general assembly here, today.
Mah said if BN is dissolved, component parties would be free to cooperate with other parties to form a new alliance later.
On Pakatan Harapan (PH), he said the coalition had failed to serve the people, six months after GE14 and DAP which received 95 per cent of Chinese support, had used their power after winning the election to attack MCA instead.
Meanwhile MCA secretary-general Datin Chew Mei Fun urged the government to reconsider giving grants to Tunku Abdul Rahman University College (TAR UC) and Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) as carried by the previous government.
She said the allocation was important to assist poor and less fortunate students to continue studying in the two institutions.
“The provision of allocations should be provided fairly as given other institutions so as to be fair to all parties,” she said at a media conference after opening the 43rd Wanita MCA annual general meeting at Wisma MCA here today.
Source: The Malay Mail Online
