Vote Pakatan Harapan to regain state’s rights — Zaid
KUCHING: Sarawak and Sabah should not support Barisan Nasional (BN) for short-term gain, said former Umno heavyweight Datuk Mohd Zaid Ibrahim.
Zaid, who is former Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department in charge of legal affairs and judicial reform, said both the East Malaysian states ought to “support what Malaysia is about”.
He believed that electors in Peninsular Malaysia would vote for change in the 14th general election ( GE14). Stating that “Umno is Malay first, Islam first, money first”, he said Malaysians should not accept such policy.
“Many years ago, I was in Umno and I saw abuse of power, corruption and arrogance. This party is no longer suitable; its leaders are not suitable to govern the country anymore.
“Your Chief Minister ( Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg) told you to give him your votes so that he could negotiate with (Prime Minister Datuk Seri) Najib (Tun Razak).
“But all those years, you have many seats, you could not negotiate with Umno because you’re afraid of them. Umno controls the country by bullying the people,” he said as an invited speaker at the Democratic Action Party ( DAP) fund-raising dinner themed ‘ New Deal New Hope’ here last Saturday.
Zaid said “Umno will lose this election (GE14) and I just hope that Sabah and Sarawak will not go and support Najib.”
He opined that Sabah and Sarawak would be making a huge mistake by supporting Najib considering that “the whole world is laughing at us not just because of 1MDB (1Malaysia Development Berhad) but also how they redraw the boundary”.
He said Sarawakians would realise that they had no reason to support BN if they looked at the bigger picture and a lot more issues that were affecting them.
“You want the 20 per cent oil and gas royalties but how are you going to get that when you cannot negotiate with them? Najib can’t give it to you because he needs all the money to pay all the debts including that RM52 billion debt of 1MDB.
“So you don’t talk about MA63 ( Malaysia Agreement 1963), Sarawak For Sarawakians and autonomy, it is meaningless. So long as you support him, it will be the same in the next five years, and you already gave them 50 years,” he said.
Zaid went on to allege that leaders in Sarawak “are very selfish because they support Najib for selfish reasons.” As such, he appealed to Sarawakians to reject this kind of leaders.
“In this election, we have (former prime minister Tun) Dr Mahathir ( Mohamad) as the leader in Peninsular Malaysia. Everywhere he goes, you see the Malays support him. He is 93 but he’s still fighting for you, so you cannot fail him or give up on him,” he added.
Zaid called upon Sarawakians to vote for the future of Malaysia because he believed that GE14 “will change the course of the country”.
“Our education system must be reformed. We cannot afford to have separate schools and separate restaurants. How many more things can we further separate?
“If you continue to support Umno, you cannot change this country because Umno is beyond change. We have to take this opportunity to vote for change.
“I hope you will be brave, then your leaders will be brave. Show your leaders that you want change, and not just promises that come every five years. Vote for a better Malaysia,” he added.
Among those present were Pakatan Harapan ( PH) Sarawak and DAP Sarawak chairman Chong Chieng Jen, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) Sarawak chairman Baru Bian, DAP Sarawak founder Chong Siew Chiang, Stampin MP Julian Tan, Pending assemblywoman Violet Yong, former Bintulu MP Ting Ling Kiaw, DAP Sarawak secretary Alan Ling, DAP’s candidate for Stampin Dr Kelvin Yii and DAP Socialist Youth Petra Jaya publicity secretary Abdul Aziz Isa.