Kit Siang: RoS’ ability to stand up to interference questionable

The DAP elder politician says the RoS’ letter to the DAP on the party’s re-election should have been ready when it issued a press statement on the matter on July 7.

PETALING JAYA: DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang is concerned that the Registrar of Societies (RoS) has been affected by political interference, following its failure to deliver an official letter to the DAP a week after publicly announcing that the party must hold a re-election.

“The Registrar of Societies is a civil servant and should not be subject to the political dictates and political interference of the UMNO/BN (Barisan Nasional) coalition,” the Gelang Patah MP said.

“Surely the letter should be ready when the registrar made that announcement the previous Friday, when in fact such a statement should not have been made the subject of a media statement until the registrar’s letter had been received by the DAP,” he said.

He said it is questionable whether RoS would dare to stand up against any untoward interference in its affairs.

“I do not think this would have happened to any civil servant if there is no untoward political interference with the non-partisan role of the civil service,” he added in a statement issued after a press conference in Miri today.

The DAP parliamentary leader said under the circumstances, all party leaders, members, branches and supporters “must be prepared for the worst” to face any ploy to destroy the party ahead of the 14th general election (GE14).

On July 7, RoS director-general Mohammad Razin Abdullah had announced that the DAP needed to hold re-election for its 20 central executive committee (CEC) members, as the registrar did not recognise those who were voted in during a re-election on Sept 29, 2013.

This followed complaints made by DAP members who were dissatisfied with the re-election.

“RoS believes the appointment of the CEC members as well as the main position holders through that re-election, is illegal,” Razin said.

“The re-election should be based on the list of delegates entitled to attend and vote for DAP’s CEC election dated December 15, 2012, involving 2576 delegates from 865 branches,” he said

He added that the RoS considered DAP a legitimate party and had no intentions to de-register it so far.

On July 9, Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had warned that DAP would not be able to contest in GE14 if it failed to abide by the RoS directive.

He said failure to do so would mean that a DAP member who wishes to run in GE14 but who was not on the initial delegates’ list during the CEC election in 2012 would not be able to stand under the party’s banner. -FMT