MIED is part of MIC, says former trustee

(NST) – The Maju Institute of Educational Development (MIED) is part and parcel of the Malaysian Indian Congress, one of its former trustees said yesteday.

Tan Sri M. Mahalingam said the MIED was the successor to the MIC’s education fund.

“We did away with the education fund as members were complaining that they were required to contribute money to the fund while raising funds for MIED.

“As a result of this, the party decided to close the education wing and transfer all its assets to the MIED.”

He was responding to the statement by MIC president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu last week that the MIED is an entity of its own and has nothing to do with the MIC.

Mahalingam, who was the former MIC treasurer, said Samy Vellu had in his pronouncements in the past repeatedly indicated that the All Asian Institute of Medicine, Science, and Technology (AIMST), MIED and MIC were one.

He said a testimony to this was the advertisements placed in newspapers to celebrate the official opening of the AIMST on Aug 17 last year by the then prime minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

The logos of all three organisations — MIC, MIED and AIMST — were displayed in the advertisements.

The salutary message read: “The Malaysian Indian Congress and The Maju Institute of Educational Development dedicate the AIMST University to all Malaysians.”

Mahalingam said the message was written by Samy Vellu and it would be difficult to suggest now that the MIED had nothing to do with the MIC.

“The MIC gave birth to MIED and it was our members who gave it life through their donation drive for its activities. It would be difficult to take it away from the MIC.”

Mahalingam said the 32 trustees of the MIED should know what is best for the MIED which belongs to the MIC.

Mahalingam expressed confidence that the majority of the trustees would not allow Samy Vellu to take the MIED from the MIC and called on Samy Vellu to explain himself.