MCA vice-president Wee Ka Siong warns the minister that his remarks will undermine the relationship between the BN component parties.
PETALING JAYA: MCA is seeing red for being labelled a “neglected wife” by an Umno leader and warned that such remarks could damage the relationship between the Barisan Nasional component parties.
Taking Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz to task over the matter, MCA vice-president Wee Ka Siong asked if the former’s comments reflected his party’s stand.
“I would like to ask Nazri now if his remarks are his own personal opinion, or do they represent the feelings of Umno as a whole?”
“His actions are totally the opposite of what his current stature and position demands,” Wee added, reminding Nazri that he had campaigned in the 2008 general election under the BN flag.
Nazri had purportedly told Chinese daily Nanyang Siang Pau that “MCA is like a wife who keeps complaining to outsiders that she has been detained, sexually abused and denied food by her husband, but she refuses to divorce.”
The minister had also warned MCA president Dr Chua Soi Lek not to act like a “Chinese hero” and mocked the latter about his sex scandal.
Apart from this, Nazri also suggested that MCA quit BN if it was disatisfied with the treatment it was getting.
Continuing his tirade, Wee said that Nazri’s remarks were nothing short of “unreasonable, ridiculous and downright insulting.”
The deputy education minister said that Nazri’s comments gave the impression that Umno did not view MCA as an equal partner within BN.
The MCA vice-president also said that there was more to BN than its foremost party, Umno.
“BN is a coalition made up of multi-cultural parties and each party has a strong bond with each other. If we only depend on a single party, BN will not be able to form the federal government,” he warned.
Yesterday MCA deputy president Liow Tiong Lai also expressed his unhappiness over Nazri’s remarks.
He said that MCA would be raising the matter in the next Barisan Nasional supreme council meeting.
Nazri was quoted in The Star today as saying that he was only expressing his personal opinion.
“What wrong have I done? This is a free country. “If they are not happy, then whack-lah (blast me then).
Just reply in the newspapers,” the daily quoted him.
This has not been the first time that Umno politicians have undermined their MCA comrades.
Attacks on MCA from Umno escalated since the former’s heavy defeat in the March 2008 general election.
The MCA also faced much criticism from the Malay-based party when it called for a merit-based system and the abolishment of the 30% Bumiputera equity target.
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