KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 18 — DAP’s Lim Kit Siang said today that he is in politics because he wants to build a nation where all Malaysians are united. 

He said this in response to MCA president Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai who had claimed that it would be detrimental for Lim to become the prime minister because the DAP veteran leader was allegedly unprincipled and sowed racial discord.

"Firstly, I am in politics because of the Malaysian Dream, which I believe is shared by many Malaysians down the decades who have undivided love and loyalty to Malaysia – to build a nation where all Malaysians, regardless of their different racial, religious or regional backgrounds, are united and feel as one because they are Malaysians and proud to be a Malaysian, and where Malaysia can leverage on the best of the diverse races, cultures, religions and civilisations which meet in confluence in Malaysia, to be a top world nation in different fields of human endeavour,” Lim said in a statement.

"I should feel angry or outraged, but I have only pity and contempt for him, who spread lies that I want to be the prime minister.

"There is no need for me to repeat what I had said before in my 52 years in politics; the thought of becoming prime minister has never entered my mind,” the Gelang Patah MP added.

He added that the DAP was never a party for any one race and that all Malaysians who supported his party did so not because they wanted a "Chinese Malaysia” or an "Indian Malaysia”, but because of the "Malaysian Dream”.