KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 11 – The question that loomed in DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang’s mind after the parliamentary fiasco yesterday was this: “Are the majority of Umno ministers, Members of Parliament and leaders like Datuk Seri Noh Omar, not prepared publicly to endorse Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s Global Movement of Moderates (GMM) initiative and yet deny being an extremist?”
The Gelang Patah lawmaker had yesterday got into a heated argument with Noh over the threat to burn bibles, in particular the logic behind letting Perkasa president Datuk Ibrahim Ali walk free after issuing the threat. Noh, however, said there was nothing wrong with Ibrahim’s statement as the latter was defending Malay rights.
Lim then challenged Noh to make a stand on whether he was with Najib’s moderation movement, or whether he held “extremist” views, before Noh made his declaration. In a statement today, Lim said the fact that this question still had to be asked four years after GMM was launched, reflected the failure of another one of Najib’s policies.
“Despite being repeatedly challenged, Noh refused to declare (yesterday) that he was a ‘moderate’ as defined by Najib’s GMM campaign, and instead sought refuge in a meaningless statement.” Lim was alluding to the statement in which Noh “declared” that he was “a Member of Parliament and a Malaysian who complied with the rule of law and the Constitution based on the five pillars of the Rukun Negara”.
