A stronger Umno is why other Barisan parties are ‘powerless’, says former MCA chief

(TMI) – Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek (pic) today said that Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had made Umno politically stronger during his tenure as prime minister, leaving Umno’s coalition partners in Barisan Nasional (BN) “powerless”.

The former Labis MP said the number of Malay parliamentary seats increased through the redelineation exercise over the last three elections and this subsequently worries the Chinese community.

“The Chinese are generally worried about a very strong Malay government lest their political rights and economic status will be encroached upon,” Dr Chua said in a blog posting today.

He added that the poor implementation of the New Economic Policy (NEP) had also posed a greater worry to the community, and this ultimately left it losing faith in the government.

Against this backdrop, Dr Chua said BN component parties were edged into the background and the Umno supreme council’s decisions often became Cabinet decisions.

“I had mentioned before during the BN convention, that to the people, Umno is the taiko (master) and if it becomes arrogant and dictatorial, it will have an adverse impact on other component parties,” Dr Chua said.

Dr Chua in his posting, also expressed his disagreement with Dr Mahathir’s claim that economic liberalisation by the government was a way to appease Chinese voters.

Dr Chua said that instead, bumiputras should not see economic liberalisation as a compromise with the Chinese on the economy and be upset with the liberalisation policy.

“The income gap does not happen just between the bumiputras and the non-bumiputras. It happens within the bumiputras too

“In Kuala Lumpur, there are rich bumiputras and poor bumiputras; the bumiputras in the peninsula and Sabah and Sarawak, too, have income discrepancy,” he added.