‘Lim will lose in debate’
GEORGE TOWN: “Just say you dare not debate with me.”
This was MCA deputy president Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong’s response to Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng’s five-page excuse not to debate the proposed RM6.3 billion Penang undersea tunnel project.
The minister in the Prime Minister’s Department said he was not surprised by Lim’s refusal to debate as the latter knew he would lose badly.
“I am, however, surprised with the length of his press statement, which ran into five pages trying to justify his cowardice not to accept the debate.
“He can write 50 or 500 more pages of excuse, but the fact remains that Lim is not brave to debate on the Penang undersea tunnel scandal, which involves up to RM20 billion of losses for the Penang people,” he said in a Facebook live posting yesterday.
Wee had recently challenged Lim to a debate on the tunnel project.
Wee said despite Lim and him having exchanged press statements over the tunnel scandal for more than a month, the latter deemed the former not qualified to debate because he was merely the MCA deputy president and not the president.
“Lim knows that unlike issuing press statements, his previous illogical answers on the tunnel scandal will not stand up to scrutiny during a live public debate and he will be ridiculed.
“This is why he refuses to debate and prefers to write a very long excuse.”
Malaysians, Wee said, had been rocked by arrest after arrest by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and revelations as they started to realise the size and scale of the corruption, lies and wrongdoings relating to the project.
The latest revelation was that RM22 million was paid by the project’s special purpose vehicle in an effort to stop investigations into alleged corruption.
“Malaysians are asking how much bigger is the actual corruption if RM22 million was paid to try and cover it.
“Despite this growing scandal, which is the worst in Penang’s history, Lim refuses to come clean,” he said, adding that if Lim insisted on seniority, then he, too, was ranked second to his father, who is the de facto leader of DAP.
Wee also took potshots at Lim’s deputy, P. Ramasamy, for arguing that his boss should not debate with Wee because DAP had greater public support during the 13th General Election compared with MCA.