Chaos in Dewan over tahfiz schools remark

PARLIAMENT | Debate on the Supply Bill 2019 this afternoon descended into chaos as BN MPs demanded Cha Kee Chin (Harapan-Rasah) retract his statement that the previous government had "never" accorded any assistance to tahfiz schools.

Cha initially made the statement in response to Fahmi Fadzil (Harapan-Lembah Pantai) who asked whether he agreed that the BN government, unlike Pakatan Harapan, had never provided financial assistance.  

This prompted Tajuddin Abdul Rahman (BN-Pasir Salak) to accuse Cha of lying and demanded a retraction of his statement.

"You are lying! Lies!," Tajudin charged in a heated exchange that prompted more BN MPs to rebut Cha. 

Noh Omar (BN-Tanjung Karang) raised a point of order against Cha for allegedly misleading the house.

Speaker Mohamad Ariff Md Yusof initially said the matter was a factual dispute, which should be debated by both sides before he made a ruling on whether Cha should retract his statement.

"The issue is about facts. Who is telling the truth, who is closer to the facts? 

"Discuss among yourselves before I make a ruling," he said.

To Cha's initial insistence that his remarks were made based on the Budget 2018 document, opposition leader Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (BN-Bagan Datuk), Khairy Jamaluddin (BN-Rembau), Ismail Sabri (BN-Bera) and Hasan Arifin (BN-Rompin) cited several examples where former premier Najib Abdul Razak, who tabled the budget, had mentioned assistance for tahfiz schools.

Among others, Ismail, a former rural and regional development minister, cited an allocation of RM40 million channelled through GiatMara to provide training programmes for tahfiz school students.

Ariff eventually ordered Cha to retract his statement, to which the first-term MP responded with "I respect the speaker's decision..." and attempted to continue with his speech.

This was, however, not enough to placate the BN MPs who insisted that Cha must explicitly retract his statement.

After about 20 minutes, Cha eventually relented and said: "I retract my statement and rephrase my earlier sentence to state that this Budget 2019 has specifically and clearly allocated assistance for tahfiz schools." - Mkini