Sharanjit Singh & Audrey Dermawan
New Straits Times

GEORGE TOWN, Thurs:

Penang chief minister Lim Guan Eng has refuted allegations that he was stoking up racial tensions by declaring that his administration would not practise the New Economic Policy, insisting that the Prime Minister’s warning to him was based on “wrong facts about what he said regarding the NEP.”
Lim, who is just warming the chief minister’s seat after being sworn in on Tuesday, singled out Utusan Malaysia and national news agency Bernama for “putting words into his mouth” in their reports about the issue.

“They quoted me as saying things I never mentioned at all and this is not fair to me,” he said. “Even if they want to whack me, they should do it based on facts and not resort to slandering me. This is what I call ill-intentioned reporting. If I say something I will be responsible for it,” he said when asked to comment on Abdullah’s warning that Lim should not make statements that could stoke racial tension.

Speaking after the swearing in of the new Penang state executive council members at Dewan Seri Pinang here yesterday, Lim said he was baffled as to why the prime minister objected to the state government’s decision to call for open tenders.

“I called for open tenders…what is the problem in that. I don’t know how it is interpreted to mean that certain communities are going to be marginalised. In that sense he (the prime minister) is not right and he is going on wrong facts,” he said, adding the DAP-led Penang government was committed to ensure it corrected all the wrongs in the present system.
Lim cited the allocation of shares under the NEP and questioned how many Malays had benefited from it.

“Tell me how many of you got shares,” he said, pointing to reporters covering the press conference before going on to state that only a handful of people had been given shares.

He said the BN ruling coalition should say it outright if it was not happy with the new opposition-led Penang government. “If the prime minister is not happy with this new government in Penang just say so. But don’t give us warnings that we are stoking up racial tensions,” he said.

So far, Lim said Penang government had only announced that it was waiving parking and hawker license summons issued before March 11.

Lim said he suspected the federal government was probably unhappy about his decision on the Penang Global City Centre (PGCC) project and that was why the prime minister issued the warning.

Asked about the worry among Malays here that they would be marginalised and also rumours that the state government planned to tone down the call for morning prayers (Azan), Lim said: “This are all rumours…who is spreading this? I never talked about the azan at all. Who is playing up all these sentiments? I only announced cancellation of parking summons.”

Lim said he knew there were certain groups trying to whip up racial sentiments and branded them as irresponsible. “It is easy to play up this kind of sentiments. If the BN has any dignity it should do things according to facts and not just create issues and they whack us.”