Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Chua Tee Yong Should Apologise to Normala

Deputy Agriculture Minister Datuk Chua Tee Yong shows he’s not a man of his words for the unbelievable flip-flop over his baseless accusation that Cikgu Normala Sudirman questioned a coffee shop owner for selling alcohol.

The China Press reported that Deputy Agriculture Minister and MP for Labis Datuk Chua Tee Yong accused Cikgu Normala of questioning a coffee shop owner for selling beer during her walkabout. The accusation was obviously a ploy to scare the non-Malay community that PAS will curtail the rights of non-Muslims if they were to win the by-election.

PAS Johor had given Chua 24 hours to apologise and retract his false allegations or face the threat of a defamation suit. In an immediate response to The Malaysian Insider over the issue, Chua stood by his remarks by refused to name the shop.

Chua was quoted as saying “Of course I cannot name the shop. The owner wants to remain anonymous.”

However, within a few hours after the above comments, Chua now denies ever having made the accusation. He explained that he was merely conveying the fact that a voter had asked him about a “hypothetical” situation should she win the by-election.

Even a twelve year old would have found his denial hard to believe. I strongly advise Chua to be man enough to admit to his mistake and apologise to Normala for having made the baseless accusation against her, instead of attempting to cover a lie with a bigger one, and as a result, digging a deeper hole for himself.

If he still insists on sticking to his new version of the story, then I call upon Chua to demand that both China Press and The Malaysian Insider to issue a correction to the story as well as an apology for the blatant and grievous error which has been committed. This is because if Chua didn’t make the allegation against Normala, then both the reporters must have independently made up the story.

Should he try to evade the issue by remaining elegantly silent, that he has completely his credibility and integrity, and is unfit to be the people’s parliamentary representative in Labis, much less a Deputy Minister.

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