In the next couple of hours, we will know.
The debate on the contentious Penang undersea tunnel and three major roads project, between DAP veteran Lim and Gerakan Secretary-General Liang Teck Meng, is scheduled for 9pm tonight.
Many questions have been raised in regards to the construction cost of what is dubbed as Penang’s biggest infrastructure project ever planned. There are also concerns over the environmental degradation and varying feasibility costs.
The debate is highly anticipated by Lim, 67, as he and his opponent were interrupted three years ago.
On that late Sunday afternoon of April 21, 2013, Lim was to debate MCA’s Bagan parliamentary hopeful David Chua Teik Siang.
Lim was then, and is currently the incumbent in the Bagan Jermal seat, which is within the Bagan parliamentary constituency.
Lim and Tan were supposed to debate on the removal of squatters from Rumah Hijau, Butterworth — a point of contention between BN and DAP in the run-up to the 13th General Election.
The debate was held in an open field called the “Dataran Demokrasi”, in Mak Mandin, Butterworth.
Some 300 supporters from both camps attended the event, but it was abruptly called off as both parties’ supporters started jeering each other, interrupting the candidates from debating.
Police stepped in to disperse the crowd over worries that the crowd was getting unruly.
But this time, Lim will have a chance to prove his mettle on a completely different ground, covered, air-conditioned and in more civil settings.
Lim, who is state works, utilities and transportation committee chairman, will be going against someone who is on “his own level”, after snubbing Penang Gerakan’s Acting Youth Chief Jason Loo.
Lim had denied Loo’s request to debate previously.
Japanese-educated electrical engineer Liang, 43, is nothing to sneeze at.
The two-term Simpang Renggam MP was the only Gerakan elected rep post-GE13 until his party President Mah Siew Keong joined him in Parliament after winning the Teluk Intan by-election in 2014.
Liang was sprung into the spotlight in May after receiving Chinese “hell notes” in a packet addressed to the Penang Gerakan headquarters in Macalister Road.
Hell money is used by the Chinese as an offering to the dead. Also attached was a Chinese newspaper clipping of Liang asking Lim to come clean and answer certain questions on the Taman Manggis land “scandal”.
An electrical engineer by profession, the “southern Tiger” is poised to take on Lim, as Penang BN and its other affiliates rely on him to give Lim a good bashing.
There has been no record of Liang ever going into a debate and this appears to be his first time engaging in a verbal contest.