SANDAKAN: All elected opposition assemblymen and members of parliament who support the claim by the Coalition for Free and Fair Elections (BERSIH) that previous elections were not fair and clean should resign en bloc.
Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Liew Vui Keong said that such act would show their genuine protests that the elections where they were elected were not fair and clean.
“If they don’t resign, then we know what they are up to. The whole exercise for this BERSIH is in fact just a political ploy and a political agenda masterminded by the opposition leaders to create chaos aimed at disturbing the peace and stability we have been enjoying,” he said.
“The opposition YBs must wake up to face reality and do not continue this destructive mode to destroy our nation’s peaceful stability. Stop giving distorted views to foreign media about the nation,” said Liew at his monthly “Bringing Service To The People” programme at Taman Tinosa here on Sunday.
Liew, who is also Sandakan member of parliament, said according to BERSIH, the main reason to have the rally on July 9 was to demand for fair and clean elections in the country.
“Are they saying that the previous general elections in the country were not clean and fairly conducted? They also claimed that our country is not democratic. I find these reasoning very contradictory.
“How can we not being democratic? The fact that we have elections almost four to five years since independence is an undisputed fact that we practise democracy.
“We are now going to have our 13th general election in the nation’s history and this is testimonial of our democracy whereas some countries in the world don’t even have general election as frequent as ours where our people were free to vote.
“For the opposition and BERSIH to say that our previous elections conducted by the Election Commission were not fair and clean is itself very contradicting.
“If that is the case, are BERSIH saying that Pakatan Rakyat’s components like DAP, PKR and PAS did not win the states of Penang, Selangor, Kedah and Kelantan fair and clean?
“Are they also saying that the 14 seats won by DAP in the recent Sarawak state election were through dubious means?” he asked.
On the monthly service, Liew, who is Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) president, said the tremendous response was encouraging with more residents turning up to benefit from the various services rendered by the Sandakan member of parliament office.
The services provided included free health check for blood and sugar level, new voters registration, eKasih registration, briefing by the Health and Fire Departments, the police, Sandakan Municipal Council (SMC), the Sandakan AIDS Support Association and the Regiment 516 Waltaniah.
He said that most of the issues brought up by the residents were very common and could be resolved without much delay, such as overgrown grasses, blocked drainage, failed streetlights, damaged signboards, neighbourhood thefts and security issues.
“I am very grateful to SMC officials who work closely with me by solving some of the pressing issues without the people coming directly to my office,” he said.
At the start of the programme, Liew led the residents to do a morning exercise together with members of the Sandakan Tai Chi Association.