Perkasa gets brickbats for ‘low class political’ article

Pakatan leaders criticised Perkasa for an article published on its website claiming that the Chinese were supporting the opposition to remove Malay privileges.

PETALING JAYA: Pakatan Rakyat leaders today hit out at the Ibrahim Ali-led Perkasa for an article published on the latter’s website, describing it as “low class” and “nonsensical”.

DAP vice-chairman M Kulasegaran said the statement made in the article against the Chinese community was unfair and baseless.

Yesterday, the Malay rights movement published a post, written by a person known as Zainuddin @ Obey-one, alleging that the Chinese community is backing Pakatan Rakyat as the latter would remove Malay privileges and undermine Islam when in power.

He also alleged that Pakatan was in support of Christian activities and was backing LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) group.

The writer also poured scorn on Merdeka Centre and Universiti Malaya’s Centre of Democracy and Election Research, accusing it of being biased towards the opposition.

Dismissing the claims, Kulasegaran said that the article was a low class political statement.

“When the Chinese were backing Barisan Nasional, everything was all right but when a number of them back Pakatan, Perkasa accuses them of all this,” he said.

The Ipoh Barat MP, who described Perkasa as an extension of Umno, said it is making a mockery of itself by making such wild allegations.

‘Perkasa racist in nature’

“What Umno cannot say, Perkasa says it. The more Perkasa speaks like this, the more it will lose support from Malays and non-Malays alike,” said Kulasegaran.

PKR vice-president Chua Jui Meng said that he was not surprised with Perkasa’s perverse statement.

“Perkasa is Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s [former prime minister] brainchild which is racist in nature. I’m not at all surprised by its nonsensical statement,” he said.

The former health minister also said that the Chinese community is pragmatic, adding that only Mahathir and Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak would believe in Perkasa’s logic.

“Umno must remember that it was the Chinese community that saved BN in 1999. If the community had followed its Malay brothers then, Perkasa would not have existed and we won’t have all this problems now,” said Chua.

He said that Perkasa’s antics are not only alienating the non-Malays but also the Malays.

“Perkasa should ask the thousands of Malays that attended the Jan 12 rally in Stadium Merdeka whether they supported the right-wing movement.”

PAS vice president Salahuddin Ayub said that his party and Pakatan would uphold the sanctity of the Federal Constitution, including the provision on Malay privileges.

“We will definitely speak out on issues affecting Muslims in Malaysia. This view is shared by all leaders in Pakatan,” he said.

Universiti Malaya’s Centre of Democracy and Election Research diector Mohammad Redzuan Othman refused to comment. FMT also failed to reach the Merdeka Centre for comment.