Guan Eng, stop playing politics on TAR UC issue

To Lim Guan Eng, let me tell you something straight. On the Tunku Abdul Rahman University College (TAR UC) funding issue, you are wrong, wrong and wrong.

Like the Islamic practice of triple talaq in a divorce, it’s very serious when I declare you wrong three times. It means you are totally and absolutely wrong, no matter what reasons (or excuses) you give.

I have heard murmurs that you have turned very arrogant since you became the powerful finance minister but your personality is not something I wish to talk about here.

However, judging from what you have been spewing of late, including on this TAR UC issue, I believe your critiques were not way off. Don’t you think it’s time to come down from your high horse and stop being haughty?

Dear finance minister, I almost threw up reading your statement yesterday, when you repeated your request to MCA to give up its political control of TAR UC.

I’m beginning to think that you are now very obsessed with punishing MCA after your hopeless Pakatan Harapan coalition was soundly thrashed in Tanjung Piai.

This is playing politics on an education matter and it is something I strongly abhor. Where education is concerned, let’s steer partisan politics far and wide.

Oh yes, despite your denial, the TAR UC funding issue was indeed a major factor why the Chinese turned against Harapan. Don’t ever think that the Chinese voters in Tanjung Piai have no brains, unable to distinguish between right and wrong.

The kopitiam towkays, pasar malam traders and shopkeepers were not blind to the multitude of Harapan’s broken promises since GE14. They acted wisely and in thunderous unison to send you, Guan Eng and your ilk in Harapan, the only message they know best – shape up or ship out!

For once, concede that your junior colleague, Teo Nie Ching, was right in admitting that the TAR UC issue was among the reasons why Chinese voters swung back to BN in the by-election.

Why am I on the MCA side on this TAR UC funding tussle? The answer is simple – it is the right and honourable thing to do.

In case the DAP thinks that I am connected to MCA in some ways, let me make this declaration.

I am a Sarawakian and not a member of any political party. I have zero connection with any party or coalition. I do not even know MCA president Wee Ka Siong (below) personally.

Neither I nor any family member have any link whatsoever with TAR UC or MCA.

On the other hand, I have more personal ties with current and former DAP leaders and am possibly more aware of how DAP operates.

I had met Lim Kit Siang, Lee Lam Thye, Chan Teck Chan, Chong Siew Chiang and others way back in 1979 when DAP set up its first branch in Sarawak.

I count the late DAP Bandar Kuching MP, Sim Kwang Yang, as a confidante and consider two other deceased Sarawak DAP lawmakers, Wong Sing Nang and Wong Ho Leng, good pals. Today, I am in regular contact with Sarawak DAP chairperson Chong Chieng Jen.

I am criticizing the DAP secretary-general today because I find his action and outbursts on TAR UC simply intolerable.

Yesterday, Guan Eng maintained that TAR UC can get up to RM60 million from the government if MCA relinquished its control over the institution.

"Once they give up (TAR UC), the money will be available and at least RM30 million annually," the finance minister added.

What sort of language is this? Is this a kind of a bribe or is Guan Eng trying to pull a fast one on MCA? Has the finance minister turned into a big bully now that he is in charge of the nation’s coffers?

Let me pose: If the DAP has established a university and managed it for 50 years, would the party be prepared to let it go? I would like to know Guan Eng’s response.

I think the answer is obvious. So how can you expect the MCA to relinquish control of TAR UC, which is possibly the last bastion of what is left of the party’s pride and glory at this time?

I also have no confidence in the DAP to tackle education matters in the country. Where were the DAP leaders when the incompetent and extremist Education Minister Maszlee Malik kept goofing big time?

I dare not imagine what would happen to TAR UC if an idiot of a minister is put in charge of this respected institution.

TAR UC is definitely in safer hands under MCA.

So, to Wee Ka Siong and MCA, hang on tight. Don’t beg from Guan Eng. Keep on doing the right thing for TAR UC and I believe better days will eventually dawn for the university.

On this funding tussle, I am prepared to join you and MCA to tell Guan Eng to go fly a kite.

---

FRANCIS PAUL SIAH heads the Movement for Change, Sarawak (MoCS) and can be reached at sirsiah@gmail.com - Mkini