DAP: Did Chin Peng really refuse ticket home?: KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 18 — DAP lawmaker Teresa Kok demanded clarification today from Tun Haniff Omar over his claim that Chin Peng had refused an offer to return home in 1989, reminding the former Inspector-General of Police (IGP) that he had said otherwise in previous media reports. The DAP vice-chairman said Haniff’s remarks yesterday — that Chin Peng, or Ong Boon Hua, failed to apply in time for his ticket home — clearly contradicted what he said in a New Straits Times article in 1991. “Chin Peng submitted his application quite late ... towards the end of the period,” Kok wrote in a media statement today, quoting Haniff from the English daily’s report then. The NST report was cited in a December 2009 article by online news portal The Malaysian Insider (TMI). The report was referring to the one-year window given to former Communist leader Chin Peng and his followers to return home after signing the 1989 Hat Yai peace treaty. The treaty was signed between Chin Peng’s Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) and the Malaysian and Thai governments, effectively allowing CPM members who laid down arms to return to their homeland if they wanted to. Again referring to the TMI article, Kok noted that in another NST report on September 9, 1991, then Special Branch director Datuk Zulkifli Abdul Rahman had said that Chin Peng’s application “was being processed” and would be given the same treatment as the rest. The remarks were made after the first batch of 13 ex-CPM (Communist Party of Malaya) members were allowed to return home. Kok pointed out that the following day, then IGP Haniff had also reportedly said that Chin Peng’s application was being “studied”. “Has Tun Haniff ever denied or can he deny that he never said what he said to NST in 1991, that is , Chin Peng had submitted his application quite late but obviously within the stipulated one year period?” the lawmaker asked. In Haniff’s latest remarks yesterday, the former IGP was quoted in TMI as dismissing calls on the government to allow Chin Peng’s ashes to be kept in Malaysia, saying the former Communist leader had brought much harm to the citizens. Haniff also claimed that Chin Peng had refused the offer to return to the country in 1989 and only applied in 2005. “When Chin Peng finally applied in 2005 to return to Malaysia, the boat had sailed and there was absolutely no reason to admit him back into the country, unless he could prove that he had applied to return within that one-year window, which he couldn’t,” Hanif was quoted saying. But Kok, in demanding an explanation, pointed out that apart from contradicting himself, Haniff’s words were also spoken in contrary to Chin Peng’s own recollection of the past as written in his memoirs My Side of History. “In his final chapter, entitled ‘A continuing exile’, Chin Peng had said: ‘After meeting my end of the 1989 peace accords, I had looked forward to a homecoming. In late 1990 I made applications to settle down in Malaysia, but was rejected at the end of December 1991,” Kok said, quoting from the book. She noted that Chin Peng’s words appeared to be consistent with the NST report in 1991, particularly in as far as the date of his application is concerned. “If Chin Peng had indeed submitted his application to return home within the stipulated one year period, then Tun Haniff should explain why was his application rejected,” Kok said. Chin Peng, 88, died in Bangkok, Thailand, on Monday after spending decades in exile. He had lost his lawsuit, which was filed in 2009, to be allowed back into Malaysia when the Federal Court ruled a year later that he needed birth and citizen certificates to re-enter. dlvr.it/3zppYd
Posted on: Wed, 18 Sep 2013 08:18:48 +0000
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