Pang brushes off ‘proxy for Nga’ jibe

Pakatan Harapan candidate Pang Sock Tao meets with voters on the campaign trail in Kuala Kubu Baharu.

HULU SELANGOR: DAP’s Pang Sock Tao says she only wants to be a “proxy for the people” of Kuala Kubu Baharu, brushing off attacks from Bersatu linking her candidacy in the by-election to housing and local government minister Nga Kor Ming.

The Pakatan Harapan candidate, who previously served as press secretary to Nga, was responding to Taman Muda assemblyman Dr Afif Bahardin, who had described her as being “Nga’s proxy” in the May 11 polls.

Pang, 31, said the Perikatan Nasional assemblyman’s statement was demeaning to the credibility of women aspiring to leadership.

She said that aside from Nga, she had served in the government as a special officer to Yeo Bee Yin, the energy, science, technology, environment, and climate change minister from 2018 to 2020.

“This experience is important for me to serve (the people). That is why I just want to be a proxy for the people in Kuala Kubu Baharu, not a proxy for any party.

“Such comments discourage young people from being interested in politics because we don’t want to be proxies for anyone. It also undermines the credibility of women who can stand as equals with male leaders,” she told FMT.

Pang, who is from Ampang, also rejected Afif labelling her as an outsider who would not care about the fate of Kuala Kubu Baharu residents.

“I want to pose the same question to Afif. As far as I know, he is from Selangor but served as the Seberang Jaya assemblyman in Penang for two terms,” she said.

Afif, who was previously with PKR, was the Seberang Jaya assemblyman and a member of the Penang executive council for two terms. He left the party in 2020, and contested in his hometown of Shah Alam under the PN ticket in the 2022 general election (GE15). He lost in the contest for the parliamentary seat in Selangor.

However, in the state election last August, he won the Taman Medan seat.

The Kuala Kubu Baharu by-election sees Pang in a four-cornered fight with PN’s Khairul Azhari Saut, Hafizah Zainudin of Parti Rakyat Malaysia and independent candidate Nyau Ke Xin.