KUALA LUMPUR, June 6 — DAP’s Lim Kit Siang today questioned the authorities’ silence over Malay-Muslim group Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma)’s “inflammatory” portrayal of him as anti-Malay.

Seeking to measure Putrajaya’s response to Isma’s attacks against him, Lim questioned if the government would have reacted differently to similar racially-charged accusations against the prime minister or quietly let such “lies” pass.

“What would be the response of the authorities if there is a non-Malay Isma which openly attacked the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak as anti-Chinese or anti-Indian, accusing him as out to wipe out the Chinese or Indians in Malaysia?

“Would the police and the Attorney-General’s Chambers keep quiet to allow full licence for such lies, falsehoods and calumny to be publicly made against Najib, and if not, why are they keeping so quiet about the defamatory and inflammatory rantings by Isma?” the Gelang Patah MP asked in a statement today.

Lim did not indicate whether he would take any legal action against Isma for its remarks, only saying: “As for the legal channel, I will await advice from my lawyers.”

In his statement, Lim also described Isma’s remarks as “downright lies and falsehoods”, referring to the group’s alleged accusations that he was “anti-Malay”, “gunning for Malays since 1960s” and “(wants) to wipe out the Malay race”.

Yesterday, Isma accused Lim of a decades-old agenda against the Malay community after the DAP leader categorised the Islamic group as a “cancer” to racial harmony.

The group also asked the DAP advisor to stop “hiding behind the ‘Malaysian’ mask” in order to allegedly take aim at the Malays.

“It is a fact that he wants to eliminate the Malays, the Malay language and the Malay culture. He has been rejecting the Malays since the 60s,” Isma deputy president Aminuddin Yahaya said in a report yesterday on the group’s website.

Commenting on Lim’s categorisation of Isma as an enemy who teaches the politics of hate and racism, Aminuddin claimed Lim has an ulterior motive in making the remark as Malay unity would cause DAP to disappear from the national political arena.

On Wednesday, Lim said the greatest enemy to Najib’s 1 Malaysia concept is “cancer” organisations like Isma.

The DAP veteran, in a statement rebuking the group for labelling his party “cancer” on Tuesday, said Isma is now in a state of panic for losing support from Malaysians who have grown weary of their hardline Islamist stand.

Isma has attracted controversy for incendiary remarks against Malaysia’s racial and religious minorities with its president, Abdullah Zaik Abd Rahman, calling them “intruders” brought by British colonialists to oppress Malays.

The group had previously claimed that Indians and Chinese were brought into the country to weaken the Malay identity and undermine the community’s birth-right to Tanah Melayu on the pretext of multiculturalism.