Chua Soi Lek & his MCA Merajuking Manoeuvre

ARCHIVES 2013

By MT Webmaster On Mar 26, 2013

KTEMOC KONSIDERS

Lee Hwa Beng (MCA) was Subang Jaya’s state assemblyman for three terms from 1995 to 2008, and guess what happened in 2008, wakakaka. He was appointed Port Klang Authority chairman from 2008 to 2011 to investigate the PKFZ scandal; he was also the author of ‘PKFZ: A Nation’s Trust Betrayed’.

Alamak, can’t see Tee Keat lah, wakakaka

In an article he wrote for TMI titled How will MCA fare in the coming election? he predicted MCA could well lose up to 2/3 of its current 15 federal parliamentary seats, though he refused (said it would be inappropriate) to identity which seats MCA will lose.

Needless to say, the current focus of keen political observers (both professional and amateur) is on Johor and the MCA-held parliamentary seats like Gelang Patah.

That DAP’s Lim Kit Siang will be the Pakatan Rakyat’s candidate in Gelang Patah is no longer the question, though many Pakatan supporters revel in the possibility of Uncle Lim standing there as a candidate under the PAS banner in the event the Registrar of Societies (RoS) decides to suspend or de-register DAP. In fact I dare say they fantasize and hope for that possibility which in one fell swoop would destroy UMNO’s demon-ization of DAP as an anti Malay-Muslim political party.

In what we suspect to be UMNO possible plan to ‘persuade’ ROS to suspend DAP just prior to the election, so as to save its subordinate, MCA, UMNO could well be digging for itself a far deeper cesspool than it currently wallows in, and which its plummeting into may be non-salvageable.

The picture of a pro Malay-Muslim DAP to the Heartland may just make UMNO think twice, unless it’s so monumentally stupid, a state of mind most unlikely but which we mustn’t completely discount.

Dare CSL confront Lim KS in Gelang Patah?

However, the question of the MCA candidate in Gelang Patah, purportedly Tan Ah Eng, continues to intrigue political observers and KPCs (kay poh chnee or busybodies, like kaytee, wakakaka).

Will CSL step in a la Lee San Choon in Seremban in 1982, to put his leadership ‘money’ where his mouth is, to re-enact a second MCA vs DAP Clash of the Titans, which Lee San Choon won for the MCA in the 1982 general election when he defeated Dr Chen Man Hin (DAP).

‘Twas then a historic event in what the Chinese would term an MCA leader courageously entering the DAP’s haw siew (tiger lair, meaning stronghold) – a case of dare to say, dare to do!

Lee also mentioned Chua Soi Lek’s (CSL) merajuk tactic as follows:

Two years ago, MCA president Chua Soi Lek announced that the MCA will not accept any Cabinet positions if the party obtains fewer than the existing 15 seats. This statement was made nearly two years ago when he first became MCA president but has not been repeated since.

Was he trying to blackmail the Chinese community into considering carefully before voting against the party? Was he more confident of a better performance then? His subsequent silence may mean he has either regretted his statement or that he is less confident of his party’s performance in the upcoming elections two years later.

CSL’s merajuking reminded me of Koh Tsu Koon who told Penangites pretty much the same thing, that he won’t enter government if he lost his bid for the Batu Kawan federal seat, and which he did to Dr Rama (DAP), … but which nonetheless saw him subsequently and shamelessly accepting a ministerial position via the Senate back door, to become the Assistant (disgracefully only an assistant) Headmaster of Report Cards for BN ministers and officials.

Anyway, ’nuff of Koh TK and back to CSL and MCA, for the story of MCA is also the story of Malaysians of Chinese ancestry, and perhaps vice versa

We’ll consider Gerakan as nothing more than a splinter group of MCA in the way PKR is a splinter group of UMNO. The genes, DNA and chor-kong (political ancestors) are the same for MCA and Gerakan, as are for UMNO and PKR.

The questions we want to ask are:

(a) Will CSL stand in Gelang Patah?

(b) Will his merajuking tactic convince the Chinese, especially those in Johor, to give the MCA a ‘second-illionth’ chance in GE-13 or suffer no Chinese representation in the new Malaysian cabinet? – A threat we may describe as the ‘MCA Merajuking Manoeuvre’.

Only CSL can answer the first, but for us to obtain an answer to the second query, we need to revisit the history of the MCA, in particular that of its leaders – and I’ll try not to be tng k’ooi (chong hei) wakakaka.

The leadership tussles in MCA

The MCA was formed on 27 February 27 1949 with support from the British colonial government who hoped for the Chinese association to manage the social and welfare concerns of the rural Chinese interned (not unlike Japanese POW’s) under the Briggs’ Plan in the ‘new villages’ during the Malayan Emergency.

Chinese forcefully ‘moved’ to new villages

Two years later, MCA transformed into a formal political party under the leadership of a Straits-born Malacca baba Tan Cheng Lock, father of Tan Siew Sin.

Among the top leaders were Kuomintang (Guomindang) Party people, wakakaka. Presumably it found favour with the Brits and UMNO because it was undoubtedly anti Communist.

Chiang Kai Shek in Kuomintang military uniform, wakakaka

Even Penang-born Lim Chong Eu, a King’s scholar who studied medicine in Scotland holds a Kuomintang army medical (honorary) rank of Colonel.

Yes, do look at the emblem of the MCA and see in it its association with the emblem of the Kuomintang Party of Chiang Kai Shek.

Kuomintang emblem

MCA

Right from its very start, MCA has been a party rife with leadership tussles. Lim Chong Eu who became its President after defeating Tan Cheng Lock in 1958 demanded that Tunku treated the MCA as an equal partner, and demanded 40 seats instead of the 28 it was allocated. Lim also wanted Chinese recognized as another official language of Malaya.

Tunku went as far as increasing MCA’s allocation from 28 to 31 but rejected Lim’s other demands. Then, in what was alleged as a political war by Tunku against Lim Chong Eu using a surrogate, pro UMNO Tan Siew Sin, he applied both external pressure (by UMNO) as well as internal pressure (by Tan Siew Sin’s pro UMNO faction in MCA) until he manoeuvred Lim Chong Eu into resigning from MCA. Tan Siew Sin took over as MCA president and became and remained UMNO’s favourite and respected partner.

READ MORE HERE