When Mca Wanted Dap Dissolved For The Sake Of Chinese Unity

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Lim Kit Siang being chaired by party members after his release from the Muar detention centre in October 1970 under the Internal Security Act.PETALING JAYA: It was 1971, and the chips were indeed down for the DAP. The party’s secretary-general, Lim Kit Siang, and several other key party members had just been released after being detained under the Internal Security Act for 16 months.
The political climate had changed drastically with racial tensions high after the May 13 racial riots two years earlier, and the DAP was busy warding off several attempts by its rivals to weaken the party.
One of the party’s chief existential threats, according to a book on the stalwart to be released tomorrow, was the attempt by MCA to have DAP disbanded in the wake of the MCA’s heavy losses in the 1969 general election.
MCA was the leading Chinese-based party in the Alliance, the coalition which would later become Barisan Nasional, and had lost most of its seats to the DAP.
“It was around mid-1971 and the MCA president Tan Siew Sin sent a message asking to meet Lim to discuss the political problems in the country,” according to the first volume of Lim’s biography, “Lim Kit Siang: Malaysian First, Volume One – None But the Bold”.
It is authored by former journalist Kee Thuan Chye, who chronicles Lim’s political struggles as well as his family life. It will be available in bookshops on Oct 25 and will be officially launched on Nov 9.
Of the meeting, Lim said: “It was a difficult decision to make. To refuse would not only be rude but improper.” But party leaders feared that accepting the invitation would lead to suspicions that Lim was selling out in championing the interests of its mainly Chinese supporters.
Both Lim and Tan finally met a month later at a neutral venue, with Tan giving his views on the problems confronting the Chinese community following the race riots.
Kee Thuan Chye.“Basically he was trying to sound me out and to have an idea as to what type of creature I was. It did not go further than getting to know each other,” recalled Lim.
Another meeting followed but this was attended by DAP vice-president Goh Hock Guan, who was later to fall out with Lim because of their differences over the MCA’s move and other matters.
Around that time, a by-election was due in Bekok, Johor, and the MCA wanted to win the seat badly to restore the party’s image.
“Let me be frank with you. MCA needs to win Bekok. There’s no two ways about it. The voters are 60% Chinese. If we lose, we will lose more than just the seat. People will say the Chinese have given up on MCA,” Tan told Goh.
“As you know, Tun Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman (the deputy prime minister then) said MCA is neither dead nor alive. If we lose, Umno will look down on us even more. I am asking DAP to do something important. Give us a walkover.”
A shocked Goh reported to the leadership that Tan also suggested that DAP dissolve itself and join the MCA, so that the party could negotiate with Umno for a better deal for the Chinese.
“MCA will give our leaders positions in the central working committee, including that of vice-president, with a few of our MPs being made ministers and deputy ministers,” Goh told the leaders.
DAP chairman Dr Chen Man Hin described the proposal as unthinkable as the DAP was a multi-racial party. Lim was more forceful, saying the idea was abhorrent and preposterous.
However, Goh countered by saying that a merger of the two parties could be essential for national unity to save the country.
However the book recounts Lim saying that multiracialism was the way to save the country and that the DAP would not dissolve itself to join the MCA or any communal party. “Goh even suggested that Lim or Chen resign to join the MCA to see if they are made ministers.”
Both scotched the idea by ignoring it, and talk of any merger of the two parties was never raised again.. Nonetheless, it would become one of the key differences that led to the parting of ways between Lim and Goh, much to the shock of DAP party members. - FMT

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