Called liar over hudud, Tian Chua faults Sin Chew report

KUALA LUMPUR, April 30 ― PKR vice-president Chua Tian Chang accused Sin Chew Daily today of misrepresenting his quotes to depict Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) as receptive to hudud, after these led to a strongly-worded rebuke from ally DAP.

The Batu MP better known as Tian Chua claimed he only told the Chinese-language newspaper that PR had agreed to acknowledge the existence of two Shariah enactments in Kelantan and Terengganu prior to the pact’s formation, and not to the implementation of the Islamic penal code.

“I think it’s a mistake, a misreport by Sin Chew. It’s not true I said it,” Chua told The Malay Mail Online today.

“I never said that PR agrees for hudud to be implemented in Kelantan and Terengganu.”

Earlier, DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng labelled Chua a liar and accused him of spreading falsehoods in the media over the opposition coalition’s stance on hudud.

In a statement, Lim attacked Chua for the report that categorised DAP as agreeing along with its other PR allies to support PAS’s bid to implement hudud in Kelantan.

In 1993, the PAS state government passed the Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code Enactment II, allowing it to impose the strict Islamic penal code in the state. But the laws have not been implemented.

PAS is now looking for parliamentary approval to implement hudud. It plans to put forward two private members’ bills in Parliament. One seeks approval for unconventional punishments, some of which are for offences already covered in the Penal code.The the other seeks to empower Shariah courts to mete out the unconventional punishments.

The move has renewed the on-and-off conflict between DAP and PAS that dates back to the 1990s and which had kept the two from co-operating for decades.

Conceding they were unlikely to receive any support from PR allies, PAS leaders turned to political foe, Umno for support.

Yesterday, PR leaders had met to give PAS the opportunity to explain its renewed plans to implement hudud law in Kelantan in an effort to contain the fallout from a very public spat between the Islamist party and DAP.