UMNO leaders’ response to the violence at the ”Nothing to Hide 2.0” forum shows that Malaysian politics has sunk to a new low, DAP said.

“Malaysians politics has descended to a new low in gutter and thuggish politics,” its parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang said today.

He said this after several Umno leaders claimed that the violence, where shoes, chairs, water bottles and lit flares were thrown, was the opposition’s doing.

Lim described these leaders as “crazy people” for claiming that the chaos was a case of opposition supporters turning on each other.

Yesterday, Sungai Besar Umno division chief Md Jamal Yunos claimed that Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s own party Bersatu had planned the violence, while Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Abdul Rahman Dahlan said the organiser was to blame for the lax of security at the event.

Prime Minister Najib Razak’s press secretary Tengku Sariffuddin Tengku Ahmad also blamed Dr Mahathir’s supporters, claiming that they were angry with the Pakatan Harapan (PH) chairman for failing to answer questions about scandals that took place under his own administration.

Sariffuddin  said the event ended up becoming an “Everything to Hide” forum. Najib was invited to attend the forum in Shah Alam to debate with Dr Mahathir and address the 1Malaysia Development Bhd scandal, but did not turn up.

PH leaders allege that the violence was the doing of Umno and Barisan Nasional out of fear that their dominance in Malaysian politics was increasingly threatened by the opposition.

Bersatu Youth had said three suspects aged 17, 18 and 19, now remanded for investigation into the Sunday incident, had worn fake Bersatu T-shirts.

Lim said he “pitied the three boys”, adding that it was “utterly irresponsible” for the “Umno masterminds” of the ruckus to treat the trio as “expendable mercenaries” who could be paid to sabotage the event.

“Will these Umno masterminds come to bail out the detained youths? Of course not.

“And this is why Umno ministers and leaders are hard at work issuing statements denying that Umno was involved,” the Gelang Patah MP said. – August 15, 2017.