Ex-deputy minister fears gov't 'scorched earth' policy

The government has hired an IT expert to infect with a virus the computers of ministries should Umno-BN lose the 13th general election, claimed PKR supreme council member Dr Tan Kee Kwong, who was a deputy minister in the BN government prior to joining the opposition.

“They have hired an IT expert to do this work of disruption just in case they lose the polls,” said Tan, who is also chairperson of PKR's disciplinary panel.

Unfazed he is already the target of a defamation suit by Felda for comments he made about losses allegedly incurred by the statutory agency for agricultural smallholders, Tan told Malaysiakini today:

“I understand the government has hired an IT expert to create a virus to infect computers with a virus should they lose the polls.

“It will take two months for experts to retrieve the stuff in the computers once the virus created has infected it,” claimed Tan, an almost certain candidate for PKR in the fast approaching polls.

Commenting on the alleged hire and its purpose, Tan said the government was resorting to desperate measures to save themselves from the wrath of the electorate.

“The government is behaving like as if it possesses a divine right to rule and shifts in power from them to the opposition is not imaginable,” said Tan.

“Malaysia is a democracy, albeit a defective one, but it a democracy still, so the notion of a permanent right to rule is inherently ridiculous,” argued the medical doctor turned politician.

“The government should wake up to the reality that its tenancy is transient and dependent on the electorate's approval,” he said.

“That approval can be withdrawn and the proper attitude would be to be prepared for the possibility with the humility becoming of a gracious loser,” added Tan.

Documents shredded in Selangor

He said Umno-BN should take as cautionary example the attitude of the BJP government when it was unexpectedly defeated in the last general election in India.

Riding into the polls on the wave of successive 10 percent growth rates in GDP, the BJP toppled to defeat with their leader Atal Behari Vajpayee telling the Indian electorate, post-defeat, that he disagreed with their decision but “I bow to the wishes of the Indian people.”

“This is the way of democrats who have no presumption of a perennial right to govern,” said Tan.

In the 2008 general elections, staff of outgoing Selangor menteri besar Dr Mohd Khir Toyo spent hours shredding documents in his state government office following BN's shock defeat.