KUALA LUMPUR, August 28 — DAP will never betray its principles for New Malaysia, Lim Kit Siang said today.

Reminding it’s long-standing supporters and the people that DAP has not betrayed them, the DAP leader said the party has not given up just yet as the country could be transformed into a world-class nation where four great civilisations — Islamic, Chinese, Indian and Western — meet in confluence in Malaysia.

“If the DAP had in fact betrayed the people and the hopes and objectives of a New Malaysia — unity, freedom, justice, excellence and integrity — then DAP deserves to be rejected by Malaysians and there is no way that DAP can recover or recapture the support of the voters with the passage of time. In fact, the outcome can only be worse.

“But if the DAP had not betrayed our principles and the hopes of the people, then time will demonstrate how wrong were the misperceptions and misunderstandings about the DAP,” he said in a statement here.

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However, the Iskandar Puteri MP pointed out that party leaders must have the stamina, perseverance and commitment to stay the course despite the temporary misperceptions and misunderstanding of the people.

Pointing out that massive and orchestrated campaign of hate speech and fake news in recent months, Lim said Malaysians were entrapped in vicious position where every community lived in fear, hatred and suspicion of other communities as people believed their culture was facing an existential threat.

He cited for example how the recent Kuala Lumpur International Airport system malfunctions were used to spread alarm and fear that three million Chinese nationals have entered the country to change the demography of Malaysia despite the ignorance on the sheer absurdity of the situation.

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Lim also went on to say a legacy of the previous government on jawi in Chinese and Tamil primary schools was perceived as an existential attack on Chinese and Tamil education by the PH government because of the lack of information and inadequate consultation.

The federal government’s plan to introduce khat — a form of Arabic-Malay calligraphy — as part of the national language syllabus for Year Four students sparked a strong reaction from mostly minority communities, many of whom saw the move as a subliminal attempt at “Islamisation”.

“In just two months, through fake news and hate speech, political opportunists and desperados had fanned racial and religious insecurities in each community into a powder-keg of distrust, fear and hatred of other communities,” he added.

Lim said Malaysians must therefore shed their ethnic shells and enclaves in order to interact and appreciate the virtues and best values of other’s ethnicity, culture and civilisation.

“We must not fall victim to desperados who only want to engender and incite suspicion, distrust, fear and hatred by pitting race against race, religion against religion, culture against culture and civilisation against civilisation,” he said.