Guan Eng and Kit Siang fail to show up at forum on tunnel project
The two vacant seats, which had been reserved for Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng and his father, DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang, at the forum.
(FMT) – Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng and his father, DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang, were a no-show at a talk on the RM6.3 billion tunnel-roads project here tonight.
Two seats had been reserved for both father and son at the Tan Si Eng Chuan Tong Association’s hall in Kampung Paya here, for the forum titled “Political talk on Penang’s truth”, but both seats remained empty throughout.
Guan Eng had this afternoon snubbed Wee’s invitation to the forum, which was held in the former’s parliamentary constituency of Bagan.
Some 800 people turned up tonight at the forum, which featured MCA deputy president Wee Ka Siong and Barisan Nasional Strategic Communications (BNSC) deputy director Eric See-To, both of whom have spoken and commented extensively on the tunnel project.
The talk was conducted mostly in Mandarin, interspersed with a little bit of English and Hokkien for the crowd, mostly comprising mainlanders.
Both Wee and See-To presented their views on the tunnel project — views which have largely been reported in the media.
Among others, Wee touched on how the state government had awarded such a major infrastructure project to an 82-day company, which was contrary to the state government’s claim previously that the special purpose vehicle (SPV) has a paid-up capital of RM4.5 billion.
See-To, meanwhile, showed a widely circulated photograph of Guan Eng with a businessman who had been arrested by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) over an alleged RM19 million payout to halt the probe into the tunnel project.
Wee had previously challenged Guan Eng to a debate on the issues concerning the tunnel-road project, to which the latter has refused, saying that he should instead be debating MCA’s number 1, president Liow Tiong Lai.
The infrastructure project came under renewed scrutiny by the BN following a fresh probe by the MACC.
Since then, the Penang government and BN had revived the issue, which was a hotly debated topic in Penang in 2013 and 2014.
The 7.2km undersea tunnel will connect George Town’s Pangkor Road and Bagan Ajam in Butterworth. It is scheduled to begin in 2023.
The three main roads stretch from Air Itam to the Tun Dr Lim Chong Eu Expressway (5.7km), Tanjung Bungah to Teluk Bahang (10.53km), and Jalan Pangkor-Gurney Drive junction to Tun Dr Lim Chong Eu Expressway (4.1km).
