TRANSPORT Minister Anthony Loke is DAP’s new parliamentary leader, replacing party stalwart Lim Kit Siang.

Lim said he will be a backbencher for the first time since becoming Bandar Melaka MP in 1969.

“The DAP central executive committee has decided that the DAP parliamentary leader for the 14th Parliament will be DAP national organising secretary Anthony Loke.

“I will be a backbencher in Parliament for the first time since I was elected MP for Bandar Melaka in 1969,” he said in a speech in Tanah Rata last night.

Lim, who is now Iskandar Puteri MP, said he will focus his efforts on “declaring Kelantan, Terengganu, Pahang and Perlis as DAP’s new, and third, ‘Front-Line States’, to bring about unity, justice, freedom and democracy in Malaysia.”

The four states are the only ones in the peninsula not ruled by Pakatan Harapan.

Lim, who turned 77 this year, had undergone an operation to remove a malignant tumor from the left kidney last year.

He is touted as among the candidates for the post of Dewan Rakyat speaker.

Another candidate is said to be former Court of Appeal judge Mohamad Ariff Yusof. – July 11, 2018.