PETALING JAYA, Sept 11 — DAP veteran Lim Kit Siang today questioned former Inspector-General of Police Tun Hanif Omar why the alleged proposal to divide peninsula Malaysia into two after the 1969  riots was kept a secret for half a century.

"If I or the DAP had proposed the partition of Peninsular Malaysia into two, the West to the Chinese and the East to the Malays, it would not have been kept a secret for half a century.

"It would have been used in the last five decades against me and DAP to show how divisive, destructive, racist and unpatriotic we were in wanting to divide Peninsular Malaysia into two parts according to race,” Lim said in a statement.

Yesterday the former top cop told Malay daily Sinar Harian in an exclusive interview that the proposal had originated from intelligence gathered by the Special Branch (SB) after a DAP leader claimed to have made the proposal in Europe shortly after the race riots during his capacity as police chief-of-staff in the National Operations Council (Mageran).

"Can Haniff explain firstly, why this so-called DAP proposal was unknown to DAP leaders as I had never heard of it.

"He should realise his cock-and-bull story would be fodder for the political extremists and opportunists in post 14th General Election to incite interracial and inter-religious animosity, hatred and strife in Malaysia,” Lim said.

Lim further disputed if the ‘secret’ was only privy to Hanif and the SB.

The Iskandar Puteri MP also suggested that Hanif act as a responsible former IGP and not be irresponsible by failing to take cognizance of the "scorched earth” policy of Umno and PAS by allowing the exploitation of toxic and dangerous politics.

On Sunday, Lim instructed his lawyer Ramkarpal Singh to initiate a defamation lawsuit against Hanif after the ex-top policeman reportedly told a forum that DAP had advocated for Malays to get the east coast of peninsular Malaysia and for the west coast to go to the Chinese after the controversial 1969 general election.

"Will he (Hanif) apologise for acting most irresponsibly as a former top cop in the country with his cock-and-bull story after he has admitted to not being senile?” Lim asked.