NEP has to END : Chua Jui Meng

Jui Meng : NEP has to end
Giam Say Khoon
(Extracted from theSun Online)

KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 28, 2008) : MCA presidential candidate Datuk Chua Jui Meng said today he will lobby for the New Economic Policy (NEP) to be ended if he is elected MCA president.

"I will lobby for the closure of the NEP, maintaining only its poverty eradication aspect," he told a press conference at the launch of his MCA presidential campaign manifesto titled "Rebuild the Party, Return to Relevance, Realise Vision 2020".

The NEP was originally formulated to remove the envy and distrust between racial communities and to ultimately foster an unified national identity after the May 13 riots in 1969.

"Now, 38 years have passed and today the Malay middle class is large and securely established, the United Nations Development Programmes (UNDP) some years ago commended the Malays as one of the most successful in the world in creating a huge middle class," Jui Meng said.

"The need for the NEP, therefore, no longer exists and the constitutional rights of all Malaysians should be restored," he added.

Chua said he has been openly criticising national issues when he was still Bakri MP, particularly in 1988 when he delivered a two-hour speech in Parliament on the Malaysian Chinese dilemma caused by deviations in the implementation of the NEP.

"As a result of the speech, the government responded quickly and sensitively by calling for the first National Economic Consultative Council (NECC) in 1989 and resulted in the replacement of the policy with the National Development Policy in 1990. Chinese voter sentiment then changed in 1995, 1999 and 2004 from pro-Opposition to pro-Barisan Nasional (BN)," he said.

Jui Meng also challenged his opponent, vice-president Datuk Ong Tee Keat to show his track record that he had been "brave enough" to speak up on national issues.

Asked whether his "Return to Relevance" and "the president must be brave enough to speak up on issues" was the same stand as Tee Keat's, Chua said:

"Can Tee Keat show me his track record that he had criticised Umno and national policies that are considered brave enough? However, I can so far remember that he had only spoken up on the 'RM3,000 become RM30,000 issue' (the incident involved the misappropriation of funds for repair works in two Chinese primary schools in Johor in 2006 where a RM30,000 contract ended up with only work worth RM3,000)."

To "Return to Relevance", Chua said he will go on a nationwide tour in his first year as president to hear the views and grievances of the Chinese community, hold annual community hall meetings for feedback and create political, economic and education masterplans for the community.

"It is important that our leader has the courage to actively voice the concerns of the people we represent in Parliament, even if it is critical of the government"

"MCA must start playing a proactive role within the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition to further promote racial unity and the inclusion of every community in Malaysia, regardless of race or religion," he said.

To "Realise Vision 2020", Chua said he will set up a Federal Constitution advisory committee to review national polices and come up with an updated Mandarin translation of the Constitution so that the Chinese are aware of the inalienable rights as Malaysian citizens.

To "Rebuild the Party," Chua said he will introduce rules to enforce transparency and limit the powers of the disciplinary committee so that its powers can never be abused to silence legitimate dissent within the party.

He said the party will need to undertake a nationwide campaign to locate all its 1.3 million members, update and consolidate its membership database.

Asked whether MCA would quit the BN should Umno still refuses to accept proposals, Chua said many MCA leaders are actually prepared to quit BN but he thought that now is not the time to leave BN and it is immoral to leave the coalition during crisis.

"We must negotiate with Umno and if this fails, (then) MCA must sit down and think what to do next," he added.