Who among Najib’s Cabinet will insist Ismail apologise?

Who is prepared to bell the cat and move a motion in Cabinet on Wednesday to demand that Ismail Sabri apologise for his racist call?

KUALA LUMPUR: The Ismail Sabri episode, lamented DAP elder statesman Lim Kit Siang, has escalated into a national and international scandal. “It’s not a complex matter but a very simple issue of Right and Wrong, and in this most basic of tests, Ismail Sabri and the entire Cabinet has failed!”

A wrong is a wrong and cannot become right, he reiterated, otherwise what is the use of all the religious and moral values and teachings, whether in schools or at home?

“All Malaysians, regardless of race, religion or station, are taught to admit when they have done a wrong and to seek forgiveness for the mistake they had made,” said Lim, also DAP Parliamentary Leader and Gelang Patah MP, in a statement.

Why should Agriculture and Agro-based Industry Minister Ismail Sabri Yakob be an exception?

“If I had committed a mistake like Ismail Sabri, I would have no hesitation to admit my error, apologise and ask for forgiveness,” said Lim. “The last thing I would do is to compel others to sanction, condone or defend my mistake, as the Cabinet did last Wednesday.”

The question now, continued Lim, is which Minister is prepared to bell the cat and move a motion in Cabinet on Wednesday to demand that Ismail Sabri apologise for his racist call on Malay consumers to boycott Chinese businesses or be sacked from the Cabinet.

Will such a Minister and those Ministers who will support such a motion speak up?

“The February 11 meeting in two days’ time is shaping up to be a very important Cabinet meeting,” said Lim.

“This is the last opportunity for the 35-Minister Cabinet to redeem itself and salvage whatever is left of its credibility by righting a terrible wrong it committed at its last Cabinet meeting in sanctioning, condoning and defending Ismail Sabri’s racist call to Malay consumers to boycott Chinese businesses.”

What was deplorable and unforgivable was for the 35-Minister Cabinet to do something which all religions and all sound education systems in the world would deplore i.e. claim and demand that a rabid racist call on Malay consumers to boycott Chinese businesses, clearly wrong and threatening the very fabric of Malaysia’s plural society, was not only right, but must be accepted as right by all Malaysians, he added.

“It’s a stand that no religion or education system can accept.”

Ask the five million primary and secondary school pupils, the over million undergraduates in public and private universities, and the over 100,000 teachers and academic staff in our universities, urged Lim, “and I am confident that the overwhelming majority of them will say that what Ismail Sabri said was wrong, dishonest, unethical and immoral”.

They would also say, stressed Lim, that the Cabinet in sanctioning, condoning and defending Ismail Sabri’s racist call was also wrong, dishonest, unethical and immoral.