The 2 dreams of Lim Kit Siang

One of my concerns prior to the 2008 general elections, and even years before it, had been about, or rather for Lim Kit Siang.

For more than 40 years in politics, since 1969, Uncle Lim has striven at the highest level of politics, unlike other politicians who indulged in low level guttersnipe politicking, such as shamefully making fun on women’s menstruation, the short skirt of AirAsia air stewardesses (and hoping to see the 'tunnel'), threats of violence to shut the opposition up (waving a May 13 book while warning against stirring up the tebuan hive), or boasting about removing Rosmah Mansur from her honorary position as Pro-Chancellor in a Selangor State controlled university, photo-shopping a dinner for three in France, etc etc.

I believe Uncle Lim had two dreams, one for DAP to take over as the Penang State government and the other to deny BN its two-third majority so as to prevent UMNO from abusing and altering the Constitution whenever UMNO saw fit to do so.

I was concerned because I thought he won’t see his dreams come true in his political life time, but I'm so very glad I was wrong.

08 March 2008 made his two dreams come true, though on a slightly sweet sour note, he didn’t become the CM of Penang as he thoroughly deserved. But I would say he was happy enough, especially being a Chinese Malaysian to partake of the sweet & sour dish wakakaka, in that his son became what he had wanted to be, the CM of Penang, ...

... mind, not so much to enjoy power per se (like a certain someone wakakaka) but to be able to develop good policies, implement exceptional programs for Penang and its people, and govern the state in a clear, accountable and transparent (CAT) manner.


In Malaysiakini’s Confluence of times past, times present in times future, Terence Netto has written on a recent Pakatan gathering at the Thean Hou Temple in KL, and reminisced about a similar gathering back in 1987 which led to the infamous Ops Lallang.

Netto said of the prelude to that draconian police dragnet, which saw the detention of Lim Kit Siang, Karpal Singh, Mat Sabu and many others (but of course not Najib Razak): Back in 1987, the Thean Hou temple was the scene of an MCA-inspired gathering of language activists who were seething over a government move to place non-Mandarin proficient administrators in Chinese medium schools.

The poisonous seed that Ops Lallang grew from was the Education Minister’s policy to place non-Mandarin-proficient administrators in Chinese medium schools, and was perceived by Chinese parents and teachers as a deliberate UMNO intention to dilute the very high standard of the vernacular schools.

Again, the Education Ministry at that time was also responsible for making doa prayers compulsory for all including non Muslim students, very much to the outrage, anguish and despair of non-Muslim parents. It was sheer brutal proselytizing.

The UMNO Education Minister then was none other than Anwar Ibrahim. This is an undeniable historical fact.

Anyway, f* all above, the one-paragraph extract I have selected from Terence Netto's article for my post today is:

[Lim] Kit Siang has been making the case for intelligent choice by the Malaysian electorate for some 45 years now and at times in the past that must have daunted him as Sisyphean in scope.

But today there are many things to rejoice for Uncle Lim:

(a) As mentioned earlier, his dreams and constant battle to deny BN of its two-thirds majority in Parliament has been achieved on 08 March 2008. Penang is today governed by a DAP-led government. These were his ‘wishes’ that his supporters including me wanted for him to realize before he ‘retires’. And he has.

Many like Hindraf and anwaristas had stepped forward to claim respective credit for the tsunami of March 2008. While that would be only natural of politicians, and I'm not concerned about repudiating their claims, I personally believe the main reason was the people were ready to trounce the BN. In many ways, UMNO had contributed to the swell of anger against itself, because of its publicly demonstrated arrogance, racism and corruption including misuse of public institutions for its own political interests.

Some 40 years ago, long before there was a politician named Anwar Ibrahim or an organization like Hindraf, the people had kau kau punished the Perikatan (Tunku's Alliance Party and BN’s predecessor). I'm referring to the 10 May 1969 general and state elections. For example, the people of Penang kicked out MCA and put Gerakan in place. They did the same again on 08 March 2008, this time annihilating Gerakan and MCA, and installing a DAP-led state government.

Then, in Selangor there was virtually a stalemate election result which led the constitutional experts to mull wonderingly whether a non-Malay could be the MB of Selangor. The PPP-DAP-Gerakan grouping also made a significant dent in the Perikatan's Perak holdings.

The 1969 tsunami was achieved without Anwar Ibrahim or Hindraf which has been why I personally believe the main cause for the 2008 political tsunami was the readiness of the voters to trounce the BN, as they did to Perikatan back in 1969. The voters in 1969 and 2008 of course were Malaysians (Malays, Chinese, Indians etc).

Alas, three days later, on May 13, racial riots broke out. The official figure was 196 killed but many were skeptical of that.

Poor Tunku who loved all of us blamed the communists because he just couldn’t believe nor accept his wonderful Malaysians would kill other Malaysians. Many accused the late Harun Idris, former MB of Selangor, for the riots which incidentally started from his official residence.

But Dr Kua Kia Soong published a book in 2007 in which he revealed that the riot had been intentionally started by the "ascendant state capitalist class" in UMNO as a coup d'etat to topple Tunku Abdul Rahman, meaning the Tun Razak clique had masterminded the violence. One can look at that coup d'etat in many ways, though Tunku himself (in his post-PM writings) expressed his hurt by that most treacherous of betrayal.

To say the truth, so Judas kissed his master
And cried, 'All hail!' when as he meant all harm

- William Shakespeare (King Henry the Sixth, Part III)

UMNO has often voiced its pride about the Malay concept of loyalty to the liege lord (superior, boss, penghulu, kepala, raja, party president). That may be true about the Malay rakyat, but we know from the post-May 13 coup d'etat and in more recent times, some UMNO members, while claiming to be both Malays and Muslims, have often demonstrated their un-Malay-ness and un-Islamic behaviours, when their loyalty to their leaders and fear of the Almighty flew out of the window.

Thus, on treachery, there has been no greater display of this lack of loyalty than by UMNO. Even Dr M felt his severe marginalization during the AAB reign, especially by his fellow Kedahans he had personally promoted and looked after, blokes like Osman Aroff, Johari Baharom, Saad Man and Dr M's own Kubang Pasu mob - see my September 2009 posts as follows:

(a) Et Tu Baharom
(b) The UMNO Interdiction of Dr Mahathir
(c) No Hang Tuah for Dr Mahathir

Anyway, because of May 13, Uncle Lim was detained for 18 months under the ISA. He was again detained for almost the same duration following Ops Lallang.


In 1979, poor Uncle Lim was convicted of five charges under the OSA for exposing an inappropriate arms deal between the government and a Swiss company.

I suppose I'd be safe to presume that, like the Malacca case in which his son suffered unjustly while the culprit got away scot free, Uncle Lim was charged while those responsible for the dodgy Swiss arms deal were not touched – can anyone enlighten us on this?

(b) The second of our rejoicing for Uncle Lim is that his task in educating and persuading Malaysian electorates to make intelligent choice is not so Sisyphean anymore, thanks in no small part to his indefatigable dedicated sacrifice for over 40 years. Today many Malaysians have come to realize and appreciate their rights, their choices to effect the political outcome they want.

Of course they still have to deal with a shamefully unprofessional and pro-UMNO public institutions.

(c) Lastly but not least, last year he celebrated his 70th birthday, a landmark in his life long career of serving the people. It was nice of Ku Li to wish him a happy birthday in the public domain. Sadly, our politics have deteriorated into silly childish partisan and hostile-racist form that very few BN politicians had the civility to wish him well on his auspicious day. I recall Uncle Lim making a courtesy visit to Dr M when the latter had a heart operation. That’s the high level of Uncle Lim’s morality, decency and civility.

But a hiccup did occur in his political career when in the 1999 general election, he lost out to his BN opponent, due to his supporters’ perception that as a member of the Barisan Alternatif, the DAP had sold out to PAS and its hudud laws.

The sadness of that event was not so much in his election loss, but, as someone wrote (I think in Malaysiakini comment section), after the election result was declared, Uncle Lim was seen walking away, all by his lonesome self. I feel terribly sad to read of that.

But his fighting spirit obviously didn’t falter for he came back magnificently in 2004 and again in 2008.

I salute Yang Berhormat Lim Kit Siang, a true Malaysian and a giant in Malaysian politics.