Kit Siang: Still no evidence from Kepala Batas MP on linking me to Chin Peng, Kuan Yew

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 18 — DAP veteran Lim Kit Siang today said with no actions from Kepala Batas MP Siti Mastura Muhammad after she claimed that he is related to Singapore founder Lee Kuan Yew and former Malaysian Communist Party leader Chin Peng it is clear that is merely another wild allegation.

Lim, who had previously asked for evidence for her allegations, said that it was proven that Siti Mastura was spouting lies when she failed to provide proof that he was related to Chin Peng or Lee.

“It is more than 10 days since she, with a doctorate, made an international fool of herself by claiming that I was related to the former MCP secretary-general Chin Peng as well as the Singapore founder prime minister, changing his surname to 'Lim' Kuan Yew,” he said.

Lim also questioned the silence from PAS President Tan Sri Abdul Hadi Awang on the matter.

Lim claimed that Siti Mastura was a disciple of Hadi and that such baseless allegations were tactics employed by Hadi to spread misinformation about DAP.

“What Siri Mastura did was no different from the wild and preposterous allegations which Hadi had made — that DAP and I had been anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-royalty, communist and spreading Islamophobia — but he had not been able to produce any evidence after more than a year,” he said.

“In fact, Siti Mastura and Hadi Awang are the best examples of the study which showed that PAS' 'green wave' was the result of the political misinformation and hate propaganda on social media during the 15th general election,” added Lim.

He cited a paper by researchers Hew Wai Weng and Nicholas Chan titled: “Social Media and the Manufacturing of Malay-Muslim Security” which claimed nearly three in four Malaysian Internet users relied on social media as their main source of news, also consuming misinformation and hate propaganda.

In post-mortem examinations of GE15, it was shown that Perikatan Nasional had tapped into the pulse of the nation through its deft use of social media — particularly TikTok — to amplify its communal politics and overcome shortcomings at the grassroots level, leapfrogging rivals that were still campaigning traditionally.

Lim said according to Hew and Chan, the phenomenon was not unique to Malaysia and was effectively a “common right-wing playbook” also being deployed in the US, India, and Brazil where the strategy was to “wrap the anti-liberal, anti-minority and anti-establishment discourse as one, with the moral critique appealing more to conservative middle-class religiosity.”

Lim had previously said if Siti Mastura does not offer any evidence to her claims, he will take legal action against her speech made in Kemaman, Terengganu.