Ong Tee Keat joins Warisan, eyes old Pandan seat

Ong Tee Keat is a former MCA president and transport minister. He was an MP for six terms from 1989, in the Ampang Jaya and Pandan seats.

PETALING JAYA: Former MCA president Ong Tee Keat has joined Warisan after a five-year hiatus from politics.

He said his return was spurred by the political turmoil in the country over the past few years and was made at the urging of Warisan president Shafie Apdal.

“I’m coming back as a freshie with a lot of experience,” he said in an interview with Sin Chew Daily.

Ong, speaking about the political turmoil in the country over the past few years, said he was disappointed that some politicians lacked principles and wavered in their stances. He was also upset that the federal budget since Muhyiddin Yassin’s administration has been grossly “imbalanced”.

-ADVERTISEMENT-

Ads by 

Doubly disappointing was the political agreement between the opposition and the Ismail Sabri Yaakob government, which he said was like a “ceasefire agreement” and amounted to “simply giving up and surrendering”.

He said the agreement, or MoU, was too much a price to pay in order for Ismail’s premiership to be free of too many challenges. “Is this what the people want? I don’t think so.”

Ong said, given a chance, he would like to contest the Pandan parliamentary seat, with which he was familiar. He was MP for Pandan for two terms from 2004 to 2013 after serving four terms from 1989 as MP for Ampang Jaya, from which Pandan was later carved out.

He said a lot had changed in the Pandan constituency since he left, with constituents telling him there were no festivals to foster unity like he used to host when he was MP.

Ong was with MCA for 28 years and resigned in 2017 wanting to be an “ordinary citizen”. In 2008 he was transport minister and prior to that, he had been deputy youth and sports minister and deputy higher education minister. - FMT