DAP gives 'Father Augustus Chen' seven days to show up

DAP’s parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang today gave ‘Father Augustus Chen’, the supposed author of the anti-DAP booklet regarding DAP’s party polls last December, seven days to surface.

Lim asked the Registrar of Societies (ROS) if it would reconsider its decision to ask DAP to re-elect its central executive committee (CEC) should the ‘Augustus Chen’, which DAP is claiming to be a fictional character, fail to show up.

“Let us give the fictitious ‘Father Augustus Chen’ seven days to surface and prove he is not a phantom - failing which, would the Registrar of Societies reconsider his decision on a re-election for the DAP CEC?” asked Lim in a statement today.

Lim however said that he “would not mind” if a CEC re-election were to take place as instructed by ROS.

“... but an important principle of public law is involved here, that the Registrar of Societies must have valid and reasonable grounds before directing a political party to hold party re-elections,” he said.

Last December, DAP cited a technical glitch that caused a mistabulation in counting votes for their CEC line-up, which resulted in one change to the initially announced 20-person CEC line-up.