‘Umno should beware Tahrir Square’

PETALING JAYA: DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang warned Umno to beware of a Malaysian version of the Tahrir Square revolution as witnessed in Egypt.

He said that Umno leaders such as Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak and other “wannabes” such as Mukhriz Mahathir were likely to lose out if such an event were to take place.

Tahrir Square or Liberation Square was the epicentre of massive demonstrations by Egyptians who succeeded in removing former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak from power.

“The question Najib has to answer is whether he is really ready and prepared when Tahrir Square comes to Malaysia,” said Lim.

“It applies to other Umno wannabes like Mukhriz as well,” said Lim.

The Ipoh Timur MP said was referring to Najib’s speech to an 8,000-strong crowd in Putrajaya on World Youth Day last month.

Najib was heard to have said: “If one million youths gathered in Tahrir Square to change that country’s leadership… in Malaysia one million youths can gathered to defend Putrajaya.”

Lim said that many former government ministers and strongmen had been brought to justice after the 18-day Egyptian revolution which started on Jan 25 this year.

‘Mukhriz being irrational’

Among them were former finance minister Yussef Boutrous Ghali, who in absentia, was sentenced to 30 years in prison on charges of corruption and embezzlement of public funds.

Yussef, who fled the country in February, was also ordered to give back 60 million Egyptian pounds to the state.

Lim said that the fate of Yussef, along with other members of Hosni Mubarak’s regime should served as an omen for the Najib administration.

“Najib will be sorely mistaken if he thinks that there are one million youths in Malaysia to defend Putrajaya to help him continue holding the seat of federal power of an undemocratic, high-handed, corrupt and decadent regime,” he added.

Lim also took a swipe at Mukhriz over his comments on PKR’s and DAP’s purported influence in the recent PAS elections.

Mukhriz had said that PAS’s lack of ulamas (religious teachers) in its elected leadership was due to influences from its Pakatan Rakyat allies.

The DAP supremo, however, rubbished this statement, and said that Mukhriz’s words were “wild, baseless and irrational”. - FMT