Zambry compares himself to Mandela, Gandhi

By CLARA CHOOI, from Star Online

IPOH: Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abd Kadir, whose nearly three-month tenure as mentri besar was ruled illegitimate by the Kuala Lumpur High Court on Monday, has likened himself to Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi.

Warning Pakatan Rakyat not to under-estimate him, he said the High Court’s “shocking decision” did not mean he would give up the fight.

“To me, losing the mentri besar post will not reduce my fighting spirit in upholding the truth.

If reinstated Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin and his “friends ... assume that the High Court’s decision will dampen my spirit, then they have read me wrong,” he said in a blog entry early Tuesday morning.

He said a person did not need to hold a post in his struggle to uphold the truth, and likened the recent struggles faced by him and his “comrades from the Barisan Nasional” to those endured by politicians like Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi.

“Nelson Mandela sacrificed his freedom for 27 years in order to free South Africans from the grip of ‘apartheid.’

“Gandhi also sacrificed his life for the sake of India’s independence and so his people would be able to live without caste or religious boundaries,” he said.

Dr Zambry said however that it was lucky for him that his struggles had not caused him physical harm or loss of freedom.

“I only had to withstand the negative perceptions that Nizar and his people have created of me and the Barisan’s image.

“I know it will be hard to change such perceptions for their accusations are all over the Internet,” he said.

He also accused Pakatan Rakyat of being “greedy,” expressing disbelief at Pakatan’s “swift way of moving back into power,” especially the way they had reported to work at the state secretariat at 7:15am Tuesday, saying this was part of their “tyranny.”

Dr Zambry also reiterated that he accepted the High Court’s decision with an open heart and vowed that he would not question it.

“I will not be like the Pakatan which practises ‘selective justice’ by only accepting the decisions that favour themselves and rejecting those that do not,” he said.

Dr Zambry also maintained that the Federal Court’s decision that Speaker V. Sivakumar had no right to suspend him and his six executive councillors still held, although the High Court ruled that Nizar was the rightful mentri besar.