Previous BN leaders reduced MIC role, says party president

MIC was weakened because the previous BN leadership reduced the role of the party within the coalition, party president SA Vigneswaran said.

He claimed that the party's inability to attract Indian votes since 2008 was because BN leaders had eroded its role within the community.

"They gave importance to BN-friendly parties and they ignored and refused to listen to us," he told reporters after chairing the MIC central working committee (CWC) meeting in Kuala Lumpur last night.

However, he did not pinpoint which previous BN leader he was blaming.

While MIC enjoyed its strongest-ever showing of nine parliamentary seats in the 2004 general election under Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's premiership, its electoral decline began under him and accelerated under successor Najib Abdul Razak.

Commenting on the BN supreme council meeting held on Friday at Menara Dato Onn, Vigneswaran explained that MCA issues were not the same as MIC's.

According to him, MCA was pushing to dissolve BN and established a new coalition, but MIC still has an issue of recognition of its role within the community.

"In the days of Dr Mahathir Mohamad, MIC was always respected as a component of BN.”

“But in the run-up to the 12th general election, the impact of Hindraf affected a few Indian voters and the BN leadership started establishing friendly relationships with four Indian parties namely Kimma, Makkal Sakthi, MIUP (Malaysian Indian United Party) and IJP (Partai Keadilan India).”

"In doing all this, the Indian voters' support for BN dropped to only 20-25 percent," he said.

He added that the BN leadership and others criticised MIC for this failure.

"The BN-friendly parties were not reprimanded, though, and received many allocations for the benefit of Indians," he explained.

Vigneswaran said he had brought these issues to the meeting and BN leaders agreed to establish a special committee to hear and resolve internal disputes.

"After this 'nothing doing', MIC will be the only component party representing Indians in BN for now, but we will work with other parties," he said. - Mkini