KUALA LUMPUR – Pakatan Harapan (PH) figures have taken to social media to blast Bersatu MP Datuk Mohd Suhaimi Abdullah after he issued lewd remarks about DAP’s Seputeh lawmaker Teresa Kok in the Dewan Rakyat today.
In a post on X, Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh expressed her incredulity over Suhaimi’s comment, in which he invited Kok to visit Langkawi “even if (she) comes without wearing anything.”
“I don’t understand the way Perikatan Nasional (PN) leaders think,” Yeoh, who is also Segambut MP, said in reply to a clip depicting the chaos that erupted in the lower House after Suhaimi’s statement.
Expressing similar sentiments, former Klang MP Charles Santiago urged Dewan Rakyat Speaker Tan Sri Johari Abdul to “reprimand” Suhaimi, asserting that the latter has turned Parliament “into a joke”.
“Total disrespect for a fellow MP (Kok) and women in the country. Would he say the same thing to his wife or daughters?” Santiago questioned in a post on X.
The National Water Services Commission (SPAN) chairman also called on PN chairman and Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to “discipline” Suhaimi.
Meanwhile, former Batu Kawan MP Kasthuri Patto did not mince words in condemning Suhami’s “shameful” conduct involving the utterance of “vulgarities” in the August House.
“Bring the gavel down hard on sexist, uncouth MPs like him! (It’s) 2023 and we still have to listen to garbage like this!
“Fine, condemn, demand an apology, and suspend him! Shameful!” she said in a tweet where she also tagged Johari and Muhyiddin.
Earlier today, Suhaimi was debating Budget 2024 in Parliament while inviting people to see penguins at the Underwater World Langkawi when Kok suddenly interjected, asking him if one could wear a pair of shorts to the beach on the island.
Suhaimi, a former Umno man, responded: “To YB Seputeh, it is fine even if you come without wearing anything,” followed by bursts of laughter from the male MPs sitting behind Suhaimi.
Following rebukes from Deputy Dewan Rakyat Speaker Alice Lau and Kampar MP Chong Zemin, Suhaimi added that he wants to “imagine Seputeh (Kok) coming to Langkawi without any clothes on.”
Last month, Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Tiong King Sing said his ministry received complaints from non-Muslim tourists after they were restricted from wearing shorts and drinking alcohol in Langkawi.
This is not the singular instance of Suhaimi being in hot water over comments made in the Dewan Rakyat, as the first-time MP had previously courted controversy over questionable remarks to MPs.
Some of the notable moments include one made in February when he told MPs that he was once visited by a mother who took off her blouse to show him that she had lost one of her breasts after she was attacked by her drug-addicted son.
He said this in an attempt to demonstrate the importance of combating drug addiction among youths during his debate on the royal address in Parliament earlier this year.
In March, Suhaimi left other MPs dumbfounded after he argued that the Dewan Rakyat could potentially be the target of “spies” seeking to uncover information on the nation, contending that there could be companies “hiring consultants to stalk” lawmakers’ actions in Parliament.
Last month, Suhaimi suggested that the government consider establishing an MRT route from Alor Star, Kedah, to Kuah, Langkawi, which supposedly bemused Transport Minister Anthony Loke, who pointed out that such a path would involve “crossing the sea”.
Suhaimi won the Langkawi parliamentary seat during the 2022 general election after defeating four other candidates, including two-time former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, with a 13,518-vote majority. – October 26, 2023