Not a word on Malaysia’s lowest TI CPI ranking or Malaysia’s ignominy as global kleptocracy because of 1MDB scandal in Najib government’s latest policy speech shows that UMNO/BN  has lost its moral compass and forfeited its political legitimacy and credibility

The speech by the Yang di Pertuan Agong in opening the sixth meeting of the 13th Parliament yesterday is supposed to be  the Najib administration’s latest policy speech on its policy measures and specifics in the pipeline in the next 12 months.

But the second Najib administration has less than five months to go, and in fact, the 14th General Elections is expected in 70 days before mid-May, before the Pakatan Harapan’s eighth Malaysian Prime Minister-designate, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, is released from Sungai Buloh prison in early June – showing how  frightened Najib is of Anwar!

The question teasing the media and all MPs is whether the present month-long parliamentary meeting starting yesterday on  March 5 would be allowed to complete its month-long meeting ending on  April 5 or whether it would be dissolved mid-way after the Elections Commission had rushed its report and proposals on the redelineation of parliamentary constituencies to the Prime Minister for adoption by Parliament.

This  “hide-and-seek” game as to when Parliament would be dissolved, and whether the present month-long parliamentary meeting would be truncated half-way and  Parliament  dissolved for the  holding of 14GE, is unworthy of a Prime Minister who is confident of support from the people and understand the true meaning of parliamentary democracy.

Will the  Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak give an assurance that there will be no contempt of the Yang di Pertuan Agong and that Parliament officially opened yesterday will not be dissolved mid-session for  the holding of the 14GE?

Or is  Parliament merely the plaything in the hands of the Prime Minister, which clearly is not the intention of the nation’s founders who deliberated and agreed on the fundamental principles of the country’s Constitution.

I am very disappointed with the latest policy address prepared by the Najib administration for the opening of the Parliament by the Yang di Perutan Agong yesterday.

Not a word on Malaysia’s lowest Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI) ranking or Malaysia’s ignominy as global kleptocracy because of 1MDB scandal in Najib government’s latest policy speech shows that UMNO/BN  has lost its moral compass and forfeited its political legitimacy and credibility.

Recently, UMNO Ministers with green-light from the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, carried out a four-day gratuitous, malicious, savage but baseless attack on tycoon Robert Kuok alleging that he had funded the DAP to topple the UMNO/BN government, for which UMNO and Barisan Nasional have  yet to publicly to tender a public apology, both to Barisan Nasional benefactor and MCA saviour Robert Kuok and to the Malaysian public.

It would have benefited the country more if the Barisan Nasional Ministers and leaders had learnt from Robert Kuok, in particular from his memoir published early this year, where the tycoon, whom I had described as the quintessential Malaysian and gentleman, cannily pinpointed   the reasons why Malaysia had lost its way in the last six decades degenerating from a country respected and admired by the world into one which is scorned and held in increasing contempt because we have become a shameless global kleptocracy.

I would commend the Prime Minister, all Cabinet Ministers, and all UMNO/BN candidates to read Robert Kuok’s memoir – in fact,  compulsory reading material – in particular  Chapter 22 on “Strength of Culture” in final Part VII on “In Closing”, where he pinpointed two factors deciding the rise and fall of nations:

– A nation with moral compass; and

– Rule of Law.

Robert Kuok said: “The leaders must be politician-statesmen willing to put the good of their nations and the people above their individual self-interest. I recoil from politicians who are there for  fame and glory, or to line their pockets. True leaders are those who come out of the community and govern to raise the people to greater heights.”

He  said: “A moral society cannot be attained through policing. You must  begin at the beginning, and infuse the young with a strong sense of morality from a young age, both at home and at school.”

He further said: “It is a  basic principle of the rule of law that everyone is equal before the law. In China today we have rule by man. Under the rule of law, even the General Secretary of the Communist Party is not above the law.”

If Malaysia has not  lost its moral compass and the rule of law had not deteriorated because of the creeping loss of the independence, impartiality and professionalism of the key  national institutions, the Malaysian Dream which had motivated all Malaysians six decades ago would not have been dimmed or seemed to have been lost for good unless and until Malaysia could be saved in the 14th General Election.

It is indeed a national shame and disgrace that instead of addressing Malaysia’s 3Is – infamy, ignominy and iniquity –  of Malaysia as  a global kleptocracy because of the 1MDB scandal, we have a Minister of the Najib Cabinet openly claiming that the international multi-billion dollar 1MDB money-laundering scandal is “fake news”,  embracing 1MDB mastermind Jho Low becoming his defender and apologist in asserting that there is no proof that the billion-ringgit Equanimity luxury yacht seized by the Indonesian authorities in Bali last Wednesday belonged to Jho Low.

This is most shocking as Jho Low had as good as admitted to the ownership of Equanimity yacht when in his reaction to the yacht’s seizure by the Indonesian authorities in Wednesday, the 1MDB mastermind accused the United States Department of Justice (DoJ) of “global overreach”.’

The Minister of Communications and Multimedia, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak’s defense of Jho Low and claim that there is no proof that the superyacht belong to the 1MDB mastermind shocked even erstwhile UMNO veterans and stalwarts, like former UMNO Ministers Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz and Tan Sri Rais Yatim.

In her facebook,  Rafidah asked  why the Malaysian authorities had not been able to find 1MDB mastermind Jho Low’s billion-ringgit luxury superyacht when she herself could spot it while on a  diving trip in Thailand.

She mocked  the  “equanimity” of  “impotent” Malaysian enforcement agencies and rubbished claims from BN leaders that there was no proof that the superyacht belonged to Jho Low.

Rafidah said the episode was shameful to Malaysia, particularly when other countries involved are taking action against 1MDB-linked scandals.

She posted:

“Please… Let us not make the world see us as a basket case… We don’t deserve to be shamed as we have been.

“With all the Malaysian kleptocracy scandals which are being addressed, very expeditiously and effectively, in the US, Australia, Middle East, Switzerland, Singapore, just to name a few countries…

“People have been jailed, companies fined and barred from operating, properties and assets impounded, even ill-gotten gifts have been returned by those who do not want to be linked to this infamous yacht owner.”

Rafidcah’s FB posting is significant for this is the first time that a former UMNO stalwart had accepted Malaysia’s 3Is in becoming a kleptocracy – while the Najib government wants Malaysians to believe that 1MDB scandal and Malaysia being regarded worldwide as a global kleptocracy were just fake news.

Rafidah said the  silence over the scandal from those in power reminded her of Hans Christian Andersen’s short tale “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, where “No one dared to admit they actually could not see the ‘clothes’ the emperor was supposed to be wearing, and that the emperor was without any clothes on” as “They did not want to be regarded as being stupid and unfit for their positions”.

When Salleh defended his earlier statement that there was no evidence that the Equanimity is owned by 1MDB-linked businessperson Jho Low, Rafidah again took to her FaceBook and penned the following eloquent words:

“TO REMIND OURSELVES.

“NEVER TO FORGET THE WILL OF THE ALMIGHTY.

“THE WRATH OF THE ALMIGHTY..AND THE RETRIBUTION THAT ONLY HE CAN METE OUT.. TO THOSE WHO DESERVE IT..

“WE ARE ONLY PUNY HUMANS..

“THE ALMIGHTY HAS THE LAST SAY..

“HE IS THE ULTIMATE POWER..

OUR CONSCIENCE SHOULD REMIND US OF THAT POWER…

“AND..NEVER FORGET… WE CANNOT BUY OUR WAY INTO THE ALMIGHTY’S GOOD BOOKS…

“AND IN THE ALMIGHTY’S BOOKS ..

“CASH IS NOT KING….”

If only the present Ministers, whether from UMNO, MCA, Gerakan and MIC, have a quarter of Rafidah’s guts, gumption and forthrightness, Malaysia would be not in such a parlous state today of being shamed as a global kleptocracy.

(Media Conference Statement in Parliament on Tuesday, 6th March 2018 at 11 am)

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Will MCMC order Raja Petra to remove articles on me which are full of lies and falsehoods?

Raja Petra Kamaruddin has complied with the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) instruction to remove three articles  on the website Malaysia Today regarding billionaire Robert Kuok which had had violated Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act by 10 am today.

The three articles were “Robert Kuok wants Chinese rule in Malaysia”, “Malaysian Insight funder fingered” and “Robert Kuok’s last chance at changing the government”.

Robert Kuok was not the only victim of Raja Petra Kamaruddin’s lies and falsehoods in his articles on Malaysia Today.

I have been a victim of Raja Petra Kamaruiddin in umpteenth articles on Malaysia Today, making all sorts of dastardly and preposterous charges against me, like I have received over a billion ringgit from Israeli sources, that I have funded news portal The Malaysian Insight with RM40 million and that Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad had given me RM1 billion so that I  could agree to the admission of Mahathir’s Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM) into Pakatan Harapan.

Another “quinoa cybertrooper” had alleged that Robert Kuok had given me RM100 million .

May be I should ask Robert Kuok why he is giving me RM100 million when Tun Mahathir was giving me RM1 billion or ten times more!

Will MCMC ask Raja Petra Kamaruddin and the other “quinoa cybertrooper” to take down all the articles against me which  contain lies and falsehoods against me

This will be a test as to whether  the MCMC is an independent, impartial and professional organization or a just a creature of the powers-that-be  even to do its dirty job.

(Media Statement in Parliament on Tuesday, 6th March 2018)

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Malaysian  Parliament confirmed as  Parliament of  a global kleptocracy as Parliament not prepared to do anything to challenge, purge and cleanse Malaysia of the  ignominy, infamy and iniquity of a  global kleptocracy

The first working sitting of the sixth meeting of the 13th Parliament has confirmed that the Malaysian Parliament has become a Parliament of a global kleptocracy as Parliament is not prepared to do anything to challenge, purge and cleanse Malaysia of the ignominy, infamy and iniquity of  a global kleptocracy for over three years.

Coming at a time when the 1MDB scandal had been delivering bad news by the lorrylooads to Malaysia’s repute and standing, the failure of the Malaysian Parliament to protect the reputation of Malaysia and rebut without equivocation the epithet of Malaysia as a global kleptocracy will go down in history as the most shameful episode of  Malaysian Parliament since Merdeka in 1957.

The lorry-loads of bad news for Malaysia  from the 1MDB scandal started with the seizure of 1MDB scandal mastermind Jho Low’s Bombardier Global 5000 jet by the Singapore authorities in early February  and include the following:

– The judgment of the Court of Appeal taking judicial notice of the Attorney-General Tan Sri Apandi Ali’s stand  that Najib did not commit any wrongdoing with regard to 1MDB despite the United State Department of Justice (DoJ)’s largest kleptocratic litigation against 1MDB –  a decision which shocked the local and international community;

– Bank Negara’s failure to lay claim to some US$400 million 1MDB-linked funds seized by the Swiss monetary authorities from several Swiss banks;

– Refusal of the Attorney-General to initiate proceedings to lay claim to the Equanimity luxury superyacht seized by the Indonesian authorities, or for that matter  the seized Bombardier from the Singapore authorities or the impounded US$400 million 1MDB-linked funds from the Swiss authorities.

– Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2017 where Malaysia plunged to the lowest ranking of 62 out of 180 countries, while other countries which had been far behind Malaysia in earlier TI CPIs poised to overtake Malaysia, eg. China likely to overtake  Malaysia  in eight years and Indonesia likely to overtake Malaysia in 14 years;

– Expose by Wall Street Journal on March 2 that a top Republican fundraiser close to President Donald Trump had asked as much as US$75 million (RM295 million) from Jho Low to get the United States to stop investigating the 1MDB scandal.

Now yesterday  the Malaysian Parliament Speaker Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia rejected an emergency motion of public importance  by the  PKR MP for Alor Setar, Gooi Hsiao Leung on the Attorney-General’s refusal to act on behalf of the Malaysian government to lay claim on the billion-ringgit luxury superyacht Equanimity which was seized by the Indonesian authorities in Bali last Wednesday as well as the rejection of numerous questions relating to the 1MDB scandal for the current month-long parliamentary meeting.

Pakatan Harapan MPs who had questions relating to the 1MDB scandal rejected by the Speaker include Amanah MP for Sepang, Mohamed Hanipa Maidin; PKR MP for Bayan Baru Sim Tze Tzin; DAP MP for Taiping MP Nga Kor Ming and AMANAH MP for  Shah Alam Khalid Samad.

DAP MP for PJ Utara have four questions and I have two questions relating to 1MDB which had been rejected in the current meeting.

My question to ask the Prime Minister whether he would set up a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate the 1MDB scandal was rejected on the ground that it violated Standing Order 23(1)(g) which barred a question which is “likely to prejudice a case under trial, or be asked to any matter which is sub judice”.

I presume the Speaker is referring to the US Department of Justice (DoJ) kleptocratic litigation to forfeit US$4.5 billion 1MDB-linked assets in the United States, United Kingdom and Switzerland.

How on earth a court case in a foreign land can be used as an excuse to shut out  discussion and debate in Parliament in Malaysia on a scandal which had made Malaysia into a global kleptocracy is beyond me, and is a great stain not only on Malaysian Parliament but on parliamentary democracy in Malaysia.

It is one of the things which the voters must change in the forthcoming 14th general elections.

My second question on the 1MDB scandal asking the Prime Minister “membalas dakwaan yang dibuat oleh pemangku timbalan pendakwaraya Amerika Syarikat M. Kendall Day di depan Jawatankuasa Senat Amerika Syarikat pada 17.1.2018 bahawa ‘pegawai 1MDB penyagak telah mencuri USD4.5 bilion dari dana 1MDB di antara tahun 2009 dan 2015’” was rejected also under Standing Order  23(1)(g) on “sub judice”.

The US DoJ suit did not prevent the US Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney-General, Criminal Division, M. Kendall Day from testifying before the US Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs hearing in January this year  on “Combating Money-laundering and other forms of illicit finance”, making the following statement with regard to the 1MDB scandal:

“Between 2009 and 2015, those corrupt officials and their associates took more than $4.5 billion from the development fund in four phases.

“These funds were laundered through a complex web of opaque transactions and fraudulent shell companies with bank accounts in countries around the world, including Switzerland, Singapore, Luxembourg, and the United States.”

Why then is the Malaysian Parliament using the DoJ case to reject a question which would offer the Prime Minister  the opportunity to rebut Kendall Day’s serious charges against Malaysia with regard to the 1MDB scandal and clear Malaysia’s reputaiton?

The Speaker is doing a great disservice to the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, and the country, unless the charges of corruption and money-laundering, and as the US Attorney-General Jeff Session had recently told an international conference, the 1MDB scandal is the world’s worst kleptocracy, are all  true.

May be both the Speaker and the Prime Minister would wish to clarify and comment.

(Media Conference Statement in Parliament on Wednesday, 7th March 2018 at 11.30 am)

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Warning to Communications and Multimedia Deputy Minister Jailani, UMNO/BN fake papers and “quinoa cybertroopers” not to play with fire by spreading fake news that I have criticised and attacked  the Yang di Pertuan Agong

I want to give a warning to the Communications and Multimedia Deputy Minister, Datuk Seri Jailani Johari, the UMNO/BN fake papers like Berita Harian and New Straits Times and the army of UMNO/BN “quinoa cybertroopers” not to play with fire and spread false news that I have criticised  and attacked the Yang di Pertuan Agong.

I understand that such fake news that I have criticised and attacked the Yang di Pertuan Agong had gone viral this morning.

It all started with the “fake news” published by today’s Berita Harian in the  report ‘Kit Siang bersikap biadap, perlekeh titah Agong’, which among other things said:

“KUALA LUMPUR: Ketua Parlimen DAP, Lim Kit Siang, disifatkan sebagai biadab, kerana mengeluarkan kenyataan yang memperlekeh dan menghina titah Yang di-Pertuan Agong, Sultan Muhammad V.

“Ia susulan kenyataan Kit Siang ketika sidang media di Parlimen hari ini, yang menyifatkan titah Seri Paduka pada pembukaan Mesyuarat Pertama Penggal Keenam Sidang Parlimen Ke-13 semalam, sebagai ucapan dasar kerajaan pimpinan Perdana Menteri, Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

“Malah, Kit Siang yang juga Ahli Parlimen Gelang Patah, secara terbuka menyatakan beliau kecewa dengan titah Yang di-Pertuan Agong itu.

“Timbalan Menteri Komunikasi dan Multimedia yang juga Ahli Parlimen Hulu Terengganu, Datuk Seri Jailani Johari, menyifatkan kenyataan Kit Siang itu menunjukkan sikapnya yang biadab serta tidak menghormati Yang di-Pertuan Agong dan institusi Diraja.”

The New Straits Times today carried the report “KIT SIANG INSOLENT, SAY MPS”, which said :

“KUALA LUMPUR: DAP advisor Lim Kit Siang has been described as ‘insolent’ over his statement which was deemed to be disrespectful towards the Yang di-Pertuan Agong Sultan Muhammad V.

“This follows the opposition leader’s statement at a press conference today, where he appeared to question the royal address by the King at the opening of the first meeting of the sixth sitting of the 13th Parliamentary session on Monday.

“Lim, who is also Gelang Patah Member of Parliament, had stated that he was ‘disappointed’ with the royal address, which he regarded as a ‘policy speech’ by the government under Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s leadership.

“Hulu Terengganu Member of Parliament Datuk Seri Jailani Johari said Lim’s statement displayed his insolent attitude, and that he had no respect for the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and the royal institution.”

The malicious reports in the Berita Harian and New Straits Times are intended to falsely convey the fake news message that I have criticized and  attacked the Yang di Pertuan Agong and that I  have no respect for the Yang di Pertuan Agong and the royal institution.

UMNO leaders, fake papers and army of “quinoa cybertroopers” may think that this is a potent accusation to make against the DAP to mislead and frighten Malay voters, but this is nothing less than “playing with fire” as it is fake news, completely baseless and untrue.

When giving my response to the Yang di Pertuan Agong’s speech opening Parliament on Monday, I had never criticized the Yang di Pertuan Agong or the royal institution.

I opened my statement yesterday pointing out that the speech by the Yang di Pertuan Agong in opening the sixth meeting of the 13th Parliament was the Najib administration’s latest policy speech on its policy measures and specifics in the pipeline in the next 12 months, but the second Najib administration has less than five months to go before the holding of the 14th General Election.

I said I was “very disappointed with the latest policy address prepared by the Najib administration for the opening of the Parliament by the Yang di Perutan Agong yesterday” as it omitted major issues like corruption and the 1MDB scandal  but I never criticized the Yang di Pertuan Agong.

It is a sign of desperation of UMNO leaders and their “quinoa cybertroopers” that they have to twist and distort my criticism of the policy speech prepared by the Najib administration into an attack on the Yang di Pertuan Agong and the royal institution.

I urge UMNO leaders and the UMNO “quinoa cybertroopers” not to concoct and peddle “fake news” to create animosity and hatred among the diverse races, religions and cultures that make up Malaysia just for the sake of political gain for the forthcoming 14th General Election.

If Pakatan Harapan succeeds in defeating the Barisan Nasional in the 14th General Election, the Yang di Pertuan Agong’s official opening of the 14th Parliament will be the occasion for the delivery of a royal address which will contain the policy programmes of the Pakatan Harapan government.

Undeniably, the Yang di Pertuan Agong’s speech at the official opening of the 14th Parliament will include the new policy initiatives which Pakatan Harapan will undertake in its first 100 days in office as well as during the first year.

If we truly love Malaysia and are fully loyal to the Malaysian Constitution, let us uphold the system of constitutional monarchy and keep the royal institution separate from the battles waged by political parties and not to drag the royal institution into the political arena.

(Media Statement in Parliament on Wednesday, 7th March 2018)

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Why are Malaysian government leaders, including a Minister, a Deputy Minister and  a MP rushing to defend Jho Low and his  billion-ringgit superyacht seized in Indonesia last Wednesday when the international noose around the neck of 1MDB scandal getting tighter?

Six days ago, the Wall Street Journal reported that a top  Republican fundraiser close to President Donald Trump had  asked as much as US$75 million (RM295 million) from Jho  Low to  get the United States Department of Justice (DoJ) to stop investigating the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal.

The US business daily broke the news by reviewing a cache of emails from Elliott Broidy, a venture capitalist and a long-time Republican donor, and his wife, Robin Rosenzweig, a lawyer.

“The messages include draft agreements between Ms Rosenzweig’s California law firm and representatives of Mr Low about the possible terms of their business engagement. In one draft, there is a proposal that includes a US$75 million fee if the Justice Department quickly drops its investigation,” the daily said in an online report.

Yesterday, we learnt that Red Granite Pictures, the company that which produced “The Wolf of Wall Street”, had agreed to pay US$60mil (RM234mil) to the US government in order to resolve allegations that it profited from the 1MDB scandal.

US prosecutors had filed a civil asset forfeiture action against the company in July 2016, as part of a much broader effort to recoup more than US$1bil (RM3.9bil) allegedly embezzled from 1MDB. The Justice Department has accused financier Jho Low of masterminding a scheme to steal US$4.5bil (RM17.55bil) from the fund.

Riza Aziz, the CEO of Red Granite, is the stepson of Malaysia Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak who is a close friend of Jho Low.

US prosecutors alleged that he used more than US$100mil (RM390mil) taken from 1MDB to finance “The Wolf of Wall Street”, “Dumb and Dumber To” and “Daddy’s Home”.

The agreement provides that Red Granite will make the forfeiture payment in three instalments: US$30mil (RM117mil) within 30 days, US$20mil (RM78mil) within the next 180 days, and the final US$10mil (RM39mil) within 180 days after that.

Riza has claimed that he never knowingly used stolen funds for his film projects. He was also accused of using stolen funds to buy luxury real estate, including a US$35mil (RM136mil) condominium in New York, a US$41.8mil (RM163mil) London townhouse, and a $US17.5mil (RM68mil) mansion in Beverly Hills. The government is also seeking to seize those properties.

As part of the case, the government has also taken possession of three artworks that Low and an associate gifted to Leonardo DiCaprio, the star of “The Wolf of Wall Street”. DiCaprio also agreed to turn over an Oscar that had been awarded to Marlon Brando, and which Red Granite had given him as a gift. DiCaprio was not accused of wrongdoing.

However, a  strange thing is happening in Malaysia.

Why are Malaysian government leaders, including a Minister, a Deputy Minister and a Member of Parliament,  rushing to defend Jho Low and his billion-ringgit luxury  superyacht seized in Indonesia last Wednesday when the international noose around the neck of the1MDB scandal is getting tighter?

The Minister for Communications and Multimedia, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak has defended his remarks that there was no evidence the luxury yacht seized by Indonesian authorities in Bali is owned by Jho Low; the Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Razali Ismail has challenged the claim that the Equanimity superyacht was bought using 1MDB funds; while a Barisan Nasional MP said in Parliament today that the claim that the yacht Equanimity belongs to a Malaysian is “fake news”.

Salleh’s defence of his earlier  assertion that there is no evidence the luxury yacht belonged to Jho Low drove former UMNO Minister Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz to post on her FaceBook the warning: “Never to forget the will of the Almighty”; “Never Forget. We cannot buy our way into the Almight’s good books” and the very tell-tale finale: “In the Almighty’s Books, Cash is not King”’; while former UMNO Minister Tan Sri Rais Yatim, who earlier tweeted to remind Salleh not to be so hasty in defending Jho Low when he should be defending “justice”,  lectured Salleh to spare the sarcasm as Jho Low is hunted by eight countries because of the 1MDB scandal.

How can Salleh claim that Jho Low’s ownership of Equanimity is  only an allegation by the US DoJ in its civil forfeiture suit against 1MDB in July 2016, and that he was only stating the facts of the case?

Let me refer Salleh to an internet posting in July 2014 which stated that the owner of the the Equanmity luxury superyacht was “Jynwel Capital CEO Jho Low”. (http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=2081275)

More pertinent to Malaysians is why Malaysian government leaders, including a Minister, a Deputy Minister and a MP, are rushing to defend Jho Low and his superyacht, when the international noose around the neck of 1MDB scandal is getting tighter?

(Media Statement by DAP Parliamentary Leader and MP for Gelang Patah Lim Kit Siang in Parliament on Wednesday, 7th March 2018)

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IGP Fuzi has made Malaysia the laughing stock of his peers in the world and Malaysia an international laughing stock with his statement last night “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”

Is it possible for a top public servant to destroy his public standing and repute, even his professionalism,  with one act or statement?

Yes, and the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun, has furnished such an example with his statement last night that “nothing to link Jho Low with IMDB”, which made him the laughing stock of his police peers in the world and Malaysia the laughing stock of the international community.

For over three years, Malaysians were  looked askance when travelling overseas firstly, because Malaysia was regarded worldwide as a global kleptocracy and secondly, the refusal of the Malaysian authorities and people to do anything  to purge and cleanse Malaysia of the infamy, ignominy and iniquity of a global kleptocracy – to the extent that the 1MDB scandal, the primary cause for Malaysia’s epithet of a global kleptocracy,  is not allowed to be freely raised and debated even in Parliament itself!

For over three years, informed Malaysians and citizens of the world know that Jho Low is one  mastermind of the international multi-billion dollar  1MDB money-laundering scandal, which has caused Malaysia to be regarded as a global kleptocracy – and the nation’s Inspector-General of Police now want the nation and the world to believe that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”!

All that the IGP needs to do find the nexus between Jho Low and 1MDB is to interview the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, who as Chairman of the 1MDB  Board of Advisers exercised the final power on all important decision in 1MDB.

Has the Police interviewed Najib about 1MDB and had Najib denied that there were any links between Jho Low and 1MDB?  This will indeed be international news of the first order.

I do not know why recently, government leaders, including Ministers and Deputy Ministers, have a special knack to make Malaysia look very bad in the world – like the Communications and Multimedia Minister, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak declaring that there is no evidence that the billion-ringgit luxury yacht Equanimity is owned by Jho Low, the declaration by the Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Razali Ismail challenging the claim that the Equanimity superyacht was bought using 1MDB funds and a senior BN MP declaring in Parliament that the claim that Equanimity belongs to a Malaysian is “fake news”.

Can the Prime Minister speak up to throw light on the 1MDB matters before things get murkier and Malaysians have to hang their heads further down  in shame and humiliation over the 1MDB scandal and Malaysia as a global kleptocracy?

(Media Statement in Parliament on Thursday, 8th March 2018)

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Let 308 double anniversary foreshadow first change of Federal Government in Malaysia in 14GE as among other things,  I believe there will be more women Ministers in the first  Pakatan Harapan Cabinet

Today is a double anniversary for 8th March – International Women’s Day   as well as the tenth anniversary of the urban political tsunami of the 12th General Election exactly 10 years ago.

Let the 308 double anniversary foreshadow the first change of Federal Government in Malaysia in the 14th General Election expected to be held in less than 70 days before mid-May, where Malaysia starts  the journey on  the world stage to become a normal democracy where voters can peacefully and democratically elect the Federal Government of their choice  through the ballot box in a general election without  any man-made chaos or catastrophe.

Let us enlarge the urban political tsunami ten years ago into a national political tsunami, encompassing rural political tsunami, where all Malaysians regardless of race, religion or region unite as Malaysians to re-set Malaysian nation-building direction and policies where all Malaysians can feel proud as Malaysians because the country becomes  a show-case unity, harmony, justice, development and prosperity of a plural society to a troubled world instead of hurtling along the present trajectory towards a failed, rogue and kleptocratic state after six decades of nationhood.

Ten years ago, UMNO/BN  lost five states in the 12th General Election  – Penang, Perak, Selangor, Kedah and Kelantan.

Despite the trials and tribulations, the ups and downs, the past decade demonstrated that the anti-UMNO/BN votes in these five states was not an anti-Malay vote, but a vote for a better future for all Malaysians – Malays, Chinese. Indians and even  Orang Asli.

Let us move from the  politics to incite hatred and animosities along racial and religious lines to the  politics to engender goodwill,  unity and excellence  among the diverse races, religions and  cultures in the country – including ending gender discrimination and prejudices of all forms.

A Pakatan Harapan Federal Government will seek to take Malaysian accomplishments to a new and higher level – including the empowerment of Malaysian women in all fields of human endeavor.

I have no doubt, for instance,  that there will be more women Cabinet Ministers in a Pakatan Harapan Federal Cabinet as compared to the present Cabinet.

(March 8th Double Anniversary Message in Parliament on Thursday, March 8, 2018)

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1MDB scandal should be on agenda of ASEAN Summit in Sydney next weekend to discuss how 30 million Malaysians could get justice from the world’s worst kleptocracy

Yesterday, the world learn about the banker son of Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Alex, becoming  one of scores of international victims of 1MDB scandal.

But even more important than the international victims of the 1MDB scandal, which are not confined to individuals but also banks and financial companies –  are the 30 million Malaysians who are directly the victims of the 1MDB scandal.

What is being done to give justice to the 30 million Malaysians?

Alex was  sidelined from his executive position at Goldman Sachs after acting as a whistle-blower on allegedly shady deals involving billions between the global investment bank and the Malaysian state investor, 1MDB.

In 2012 and 2013, while Alex was working at Goldman Sachs in Singapore, the bank raised US$6 billion (RM24 billion) in bonds for 1MDB, in deals organised by senior banker Tim Leissner.

The bank earned US$590 million in fees and commissions from the 1MDB deal.

Alex, who was not involved in the bond dealings, said he raised concerns with colleagues about the high price, as well as the lack of clarity in offer documents on the use of the money.

Alex’s revelation has come at an awkward time for the Malaysian Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak,  who chaired 1MDB advisory board, not only be because of the ASEAN Summit in Sydney next weekend, which Najib originally scheduled to attend, but undermine a major pre-general election media offensive to deny that 1MDB scandal existed.

A glimpse to this major pre-general election media offensive was offered by  the ridiculous statement by the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun that there is “nothing to link Jho Loh with 1MDB” and the equally ridiculous statement by the Minister for Communications and Multimedia, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak that  there is no evidence that the billion-ringgit luxury superyacht Equanimity seized by the Indonesian authorities in Bali last week was owned by Jho Low.

It is simply unthinkable that the Malaysian authorities are perpetrating a media scam of fake news, claiming that the 1MDB scandal, which turned Malaysian into a global kleptoracy in the past four years, does not exist and nothing more than “fake news”.

The Bloomberg international news agency has just published an updated “Guide to the Worldwide Probes of Malaysia’s 1MDB Fund”, stating that 1MDB, “supposed to attract foreign investment” had “spurred criminal and regulatory investigations around the world that have cast an unflattering spotlight on financial deal-making, election spending and political patronage under Prime Minister Najib Razak”.

There are  probes related to 1MDB in at least 10 countries, focused on possible embezzlement or money laundering.

On “Who is involved?”, the Bloomberg update listed individual and financial companies including Jho Low, described as “a central figure” in the 1MDB scandal “who set up shell companies to collect proceeds from the funds and arranged the withdrawal of tens of millions of dollars to pay Malaysian government officials and for his own lavish spending”; and Riza Aziz,  Najib’s stepson and “a friend of Jho Low”, who co-founded the movie production company, Red Granite, that paid US$60 million to settle U.S. Justice Department claims it financed the “Wolf of Wall Street” with money siphoned from 1MDB.

The 1MDB scandal which turned Malaysia into a global kleptocracy should be on the agenda of the ASEAN summit in Sydney, which should discuss how justice could  be restored  to the 30 million Malaysians who are the real victims of the world’s worst kleptocracy.

(Media Statement in Gelang Patah on Friday, March 9, 2018)

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Best way to remember Sanusi is to fulfill his dream for a change of government in Putrajaya in the 14GE

It is sad to receive news of Sanusi Junid’s passing this morning.

He himself said he was living on “borrowed time” and  his attendance of the launch of Pakatan Harapan’s Manifesto  for the 14th General Election in Shah Alam last night  showed the significant progress  achieved to realise his last dream of his “borrowed time” – to save Malaysia  from the trajectory of a failed, rogue and kleptocratic state and to re-set nation building policies and directions to make Malaysia a success story and a  world-class nation.

The best way to remember Sanusi is to fulfil his dream for a change of government in Putrajay in the 14th General Elections.

Sanusi will not be able to be with patriotic Malaysians in the 14E hustings to save Malaysia for future generations, but we know that his soul and spirit will be with us in the great uphill battle for the first power transition in six decades of the nation’s history and to start the journey  for Malaysia to become a normal democracy where voters can peacefully and democratically elect the Federal Government of their choice though the ballot box in a general election without fear or threat of man-made chaos or catastrophe.

The Pakatan Harapan Manifesto launched last night was the most powerful rebuttal of the lies, falsehoods and hypocrisies coming from UMNO/BN quarters and their army of quinoa cybertroopers  that the Malays will perish if UMNO is defeated.

The Malays in Penang and Selangor, just like the Chinese and Indians,  had a better deal under the Pakatan State Governments in the past ten years since 2008  than when under  the previous UMNO/BN rule.

Similarly, all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli will have a better life under Pakatan Harapan Federal Government after the 14th General Election as spelt out in the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election Manifesto launched last night.

Pakatan Harapan wants to continue as the Federal Government in the 15th and 16th General Elections and in the decades after, and we are fully conscious that if Pakatan Harapan Federal Government in Putrajaya fails to deliver its promises  to all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli, to have a better life,  the voters have the right to reject Pakatan Harapan in future general elections and  elect a replacement, including UMNO/BN if still on the political scene.

With Sanusi’s passing,  the still  living must continue the worthy fight which engaged him in his final years.

Condolences to the Sanusi  family with the passing of a great Malaysian patriot.

(Media Statement in Gelang Patah on Friday, 9th March 2018)

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Ministers who agree with  Nazri and find it easy to defend Najib on the 1MDB scandal because Najib is innocent of all allegations made against him please  put up your hand!

The Minister for Tourism and Culture, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz is the latest addition to the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s growing band of 1MDB court jesters.

Nazri made quite a fantastic statement in his exclusive interview with Malaysiakini, declaring that it is not difficult to defend his “boss”, as Najib is innocent of all the allegations against him with regard to the 1MDB scandal.

I get the impression that Nazri is the only Minister who feels that it is easy to defend the Prime Minister over the 1MDB scandal on the ground the Najib is innocent of all the allegations against him.

We have had a Minister, one who had been named Cabinet spokesman for 1MDB in 2015, who fell ill because of the mental agony he had to go through to defend the 1MDB scandal.

The MP for Tambun and former Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Husni Hasnadzlah himself said that handling 1MDB had made him ill, that he was under heavy stress for months while trying to resolve the controversy and suffered high blood pressure; that a question from a senior official of Bank Negara that “Everyone knows that you are not involved in 1MDB. Why are you feeling stressed over the 1MDB issue?” finally prompted his decision to resign from the Cabinet; and that after his resignation, he felt relieved as “1MDB no longer disturbs my mind and heart”.

In his speech on the 2017 Budget debate in October 2016, Husni questioned the government’s motive in setting up 1MDD which he stated had seen a lot of misappropriation with no action taken; why USD4 billion was invested in Aabar Investments PJS Ltd, which was not owned by IPIC; why no legal action was taken against the management of 1MDB for investing in the wrong places; the reasons for the Retirement Fund Incorporated (KWAP) decision to loan a lump sum of RM4 billion to SRC International, a former subsidiary of 1MDB; and the reason behind limited tenders in government procurements without the knowledge of the tender committee.

But after his speech in Parliament October 2016, the then Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar announced police investigation on Husni alleging that Husni had tried to incite the people into believing that Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak had committed an offence, even though investigations into 1MDB had not been completed.

What is the outcome of these police investigations against Husni?

Husni found life outside the Cabinet walking the straight and narrow path equally trying, turning him within a year from a Najib critic on 1MDB into a Najib sycophant with a most unforgettable speech in Parliament on the 2018 Budget debate in November 2017!

Husni’s replacement in Cabinet, Second Finance Minister  Datuk Seri Johari Abdul Ghani also could not  become a Nazri.

Announced as the “gatekeeper” in the resolution of the 1MDB scandal and a key player in the whole 1MDB imbroglio in July 2016, Johari was completely sidelined in the 1MDB-IPIC “arbitration settlement” in April 2017.

Johari had earlier expressed his confidence about 1MDB’s legal position in the arbitration case and bringing to book the culprits in the 1MDB scandal.

On 1st August 2016, Johari said in an interview that after going through 1MDB’s documents, he was confident of the company’s legal position and that the arbitration case will go in 1MDB’s favour.

This is what Johari said: “As far as I am concerned, I am very confident that we will win. I have looked in detail all the documents supplied by 1MDB.

“The dispute is that they (IPIC) do not acknowledge Aabar BVI as their company. But our records show it indeed belongs to them.

“Now suddenly they claim it does not belong to them. Let the arbitration court look at our documents. We need to make sure we fight and win this case.”

But the Malaysian Government did an “about turn” and agreed in April 2017 to the so-called “arbitration settlement” which would involve (i) 1MDB conceding that Aabar BVI is not IPIC company and 1MDB and Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MoF, Inc) assuming all liabilities from the US$3.5 billion of bonds which were previously guaranteed by IPIC; and (ii) the Malaysian taxpayers having to pay double the US$3.5 billion bailout of 1MDB.

Like his predecessor, Johari was not a Nazri who  could find it easy to defend Najib as the Prime Minister is innocent of all the allegations made against him on the 1MDB scandal.

Who are the other Cabinet Ministers who, like Nazri, finds it easy to defend the Prime Minister because Najib is innocent of all the allegations on the 1MDB scandal made against him?

It could not be the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Ser Rahman Dahlan, who had gone into hiding on the subject since his foolish public admission that “MO1” was none other than the Prime Minister Najib!

Could it be the latest “boy-wonder”, the Minister for Communications and Multi-media who recently made the ludicrous statement that there is no evidence that the billion ringgit luxury superyacht Equanimity which was seized by the Indonesian authorities in Bali last week is owned by Jho Low?

Let all other Ministers who agree with Nazri that it is  easy to defend Najib on the 1MDB scandal because Najib is innocent of all allegations made against him put up their hands!

The ridiculous statement by the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun that there is  “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB” is evidence Najib’s band of court jesters is  spreading and enlarging from the Executive to the Legislature and the Judiciary, undermining the doctrine of separation of powers and the independence, impartiality and professionalism of national institutions, whether Parliament, Police, the Attorney-General’s Chambers, the Judiciary, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, the Multimedia and Communications Commission, etc.

Has IGP Fuzi asked Prime Minister Najib about the link between Jho Low and 1MDB, or is it one question he dare not ask?

(Media Statement in Gelang Patah on Friday, March 9, 2018)

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Why did IGP go out of a limb to make the ridiculous statement that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”?

For the past three days, informed and concerned Malaysians must have felt very uneasy and uncomfortable, as if  a bone  is stuck in the throat, asking why the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun, had gone out of a limb to make the ridiculous statement that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”?

The whole world knows that if there is no Jho Low, there is no 1MDB.

How had  the Malaysian Police, which had quite an international reputation for its professionalism, sunk so low as to come to such a conclusion which has made the Malaysian police the laughing stock of its police peers in the world and the butt of jokes of the international community?

All Fuzi  needs to do to disabuse himself of such a ridiculous notion is to meet and ask the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak whether there is any link between Jho Low and 1MDB.

Did Fuzi meet the Prime Minister or is this a question which is a “no, no” for an IGP to ask the Prime Minister?

Would Najib voluntarily inform the IGP that he was wrong and ill-advised to come to such a conclusion?

Would Najib dare to declare, as Fuji has stated, that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”?

If Fuzi does not want to confront Najib himself on the links of Jho Loh with 1MDB, all he needs to do  is to refer to the United States Department of Justice’s (DoJ) largest kleptocratic litigation against 1MDB.

Has Fuzi read the US DoJ’s kleptocratic litigation proceedings?

Does he need to be pointed out the relevant parts of the 251-page 958-paragraph US DoJ kleptocratic litigation proceedings where Jho Low was  specifically mentioned as the mastermind in the international conspiracy in the five years from 2009 to 2014 where billions of US dollars were fraudulently diverted from 1MDB through various means, including by defrauding foreign banks and by money-laundering the proceeds of the criminal conduct including “in and through US financial institutions”?

I am prepared to meet and do Fuzi this free service, if he is obstinate in his view that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”.

Just name the day and time, and I will appear at Bukit Aman to do Fuzi this free service.

Is Fuzi unaware that two Wall Street Journal journalists will release their book on Jho Low and 1MDB in September with the title “Billion Dollar Whale: The Man Who Fooled Wall Street, Hollywood, and the World”?

Surely Fuzi is aware of the book

publisher’s note on Amazon.com, promising that the book will be  an “epic true-tale of hubris and

greed”, revealing “how  a young

social climber pulled off one of the biggest financial heists in history –

right under the nose of the global financial industry – exposing the shocking secret nexus of elite wealth, banking, Hollywood, and politics”?

Does Fuzi want the book to be updated to include Jho Low’s exploits in  the 1MDB scandal in putting the Malaysian police force to shame?

Or has the denial complex, that there is nothing to link Jho Low with the 1MDB scandal, become a required position for all the top holders of public office in Malaysia whether the Police, the Attorney-General’s Chambers, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Bank Negara, the Judiciary  and even for  the Parliament Speaker?

(Media Statement in Kuala Lumpur on Saturday, 10th March 2018)

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Will Parliament be dissolved in the third week of March and PPBM deregistered before Nomination Day of 14GE?

Political news jostled for attention in the past few days  but two items won hands down last night, raising two questions: Will Parliament be dissolved in the third week of March and will Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM) of Tun Mahathir Mohamad  and Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin be deregistered before Nomination Day so that it could not use its party symbol in the 14th General Election?

This follows two news reports: One that the Election Commission has submitted its final report on the redelineation of electoral constituencies for parliamentary and state constituencies to the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

This means that a motion of the Prime Minister on the redelineation of constituencies is likely to be placed on the parliamentary order paper next week, which could be adopted as early as the Monday of the third week of March, ie. March 18.

The Thirteenth Schedule of the Malaysian Constitution, reads:

”9. As soon as may be after the Election Commission have submitted their report to the Prime Minister under section 8, he shall lay the report before the House of Representatives, together (except in a case where the report states that no alteration is required to be made) with the draft of an Order to be made under section 12 for giving effect, with or without modifications, to the recommendations contained in the report.

“10. If any draft Order referred to in section 9 is approved by the House of Representatives by resolution supported by the votes of not less than one half of the total number of members of that House, the Prime Minister shall submit the draft Order to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong.

“11. If a motion for the approval of any draft Order referred to in section 9 is rejected by the House of Representatives, or is withdrawn by leave of the House, or is not supported by the votes of not less than one-half of the total number of members of the House, the Prime Minister may, after such consultation with the Election Commission as he may consider necessary, amend the draft and lay the amended draft before the House of Representatives; and if the draft as so amended is approved by the House by a resolution supported by the votes of not less than one-half of the total number of members of the House, the Prime Minister shall submit the amended draft to the Yang diPertuan Agong.

“12. Where the draft of an Order is submitted to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong under this Part, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong shall make an Order in the terms of the draft submitted to him, and the Order shall come into force on such date as may be specified therein: Provided that the coming into force of any such Order shall not affect any election to the House of Representatives or a Legislative Assembly until the next dissolution of Parliament or the Assembly, as the case may be, occurring on or after that date.”

Hence the question whether Parliament will be dissolved in the third week of Parliament for the 14th General Election.

But an international news magazine, the Economist,  has beaten the Prime Minister and the Election Commission to the gun with an  article in the Leaders Section under the headline: “Stop, thief! Malaysia’s PM is about to steal an election”

It is a shocking and agonising reflection as to how low Malaysia’s international stocks and standing have fallen in the last few years, after Malaysia had catapulted to the stratosphere of a global kleptocracy.

The Economist article said Najib feared that most voters would not vote Barisan Nasional to power again if given a choice, and that Najib is “taking their choice away” by means of gerrymandering and malapportionment, among other tactics.

It cited the 1MDB scandal, in which US authorities say billions of ringgit have been misused.

It said:
“In most countries, a government that allowed US$4.5 billion to go missing from a state development agency would struggle to win re-election.

“If some US$681 million had appeared in the prime minister’s personal account around the same time, which he breezily explained away as a gift from an unnamed admirer, the task would be all the harder.

“An apparent cover-up, involving the dismissal of officials investigating, or merely complaining about the scandal, might be the last straw for voters. But in Malaysian elections, alas, voters do not count for much.”

The Economist noted that the gerrymandering practice (malapportionment) is so unfair that it is illegal in most countries, including Malaysia, where the constitution says that electoral districts must be ‘approximately equal’ in size.

The second news item is equally ominous.

Is the 30 days’ notice given by the Registrar of Societies Suriyati Ibrahim to PPBM  until March 29 to provide answers and documents an indication that the PPBM would be deregistered in circumstances that the party which Tun Mahathir and Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had formed would not be able to participate as a political party using its party symbol in time for Nomination Day for the 14th General Election?

In the last few days, several political news had jostled for national attention, but the following three items lead the field:

Firstly, the revelation by PKR National Vice Chairman and Invoke founder, Rafizi Ramli that latest Invoke survey results indicate the Pakatan Harapan can win five states in the 14th General Election – Kedah, Perak and Johor as well as retaining Selangor and Penang.

· The Invoke survey, which polled 2,000 respondents also revealed:

· the possibility of two hung state assemblies – Malacca and Negri Sembilan;

· calculates that Harapan is expected to win 89 parliamentary seats in the Peninsular over the expected 76 seats to be won by BN; and

· PAS will not win any parliamentary or state seats and will even lose Kelantan – a state it has held since 1990 – to BN.

Rafizi expected Pakatan Harapan  to win eight parliamentary seats in Sabah and five to six in Sarawak. Taken altogether, Invoke’s model predicts that, for now, the opposition is capable of winning 103 seats – 19 short to form the federal government.

Rafizi said Invoke’s survey found that 44.2 percent of Chinese voters would support Harapan while 18.9 would support BN. He said the data showed that none would vote for PAS.

As for Indian voters, Rafizi said the survey showed that 45.4 percent would vote for BN while 24.9 percent supported Harapan and another 0.2 percent backed PAS.

However, some 30 percent to 35 percent of voters remain undecided.

Secondly, the launch of the Pakatan Harapan Manifesto for the 14th General Election on Thursday night, which was the most powerful rebuttal of the lies, falsehoods and hypocrisies coming from UMNO/BN quarters and their army of quinoa cybertroopers that the Malays will perish if UMNO is defeated.

The Malays in Penang and Selangor, just like the Chinese and Indians, had a better deal under the Pakatan State Governments in the past ten years since 2008 than when under the previous UMNO/BN rule.

Similarly, all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli will have a better life under Pakatan Harapan Federal Government after the 14th General Election as spelt out in the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election Manifesto.

Pakatan Harapan wants to continue as the Federal Government in the 15th and 16th General Elections and in the decades after, and we are fully conscious that if Pakatan Harapan Federal Government in Putrajaya fails to deliver its promises to all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli, to have a better life, the voters have the right to reject Pakatan Harapan in future general elections and elect a replacement, including UMNO/BN if still on the political scene.

Thirdly, the ludicrous claim by the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB” –  evidence that Najib and his UMNO/BN strategists and quinoa cybertroopers would be launching a major pre-general election media offensive on Fake News  designed to (i) peddle the notion that the entire 1MDB scandal is “fake news”; and (ii) to harass and persecute Pakatan Harapan and civil society leaders for violation of “fake news” laws when they are in fact speaking the truth about corruption, abuses of power and misdeeds of the present-day Government in Putrajaya. The Azalina Committee on Fake News is a part of this major UMNO/BN offensive on fake news.

Things will not hot up further in the coming days and weeks up to the 14th GE.

(Media Statement in Kuala Lumpur on Saturday, 10th March 2018)

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I have emailed Swiss MPs asking them to support the motion in Swiss Parliament  to repatriate  RM430 million 1MDB-related funds confiscated from Swiss banks because of corruption to Malaysia to  benefit Malaysians harmed by the 1MDB scandal

I have emailed Swiss Members of Parliament asking them to support the motion in Swiss Parliament to repatriate  RM430 million 1MDB-related funds confiscated from Swiss banks because of money-laundering and other corrupt practices to Malaysia so as  to benefit Malaysians harmed by the international mega 1MDB financial scandal.

The Swiss Parliament is to debate  a motion on Tuesday calling for the repatriation of confiscated corruption funds, including the CHF104 million (RM430 million) allegedly stolen and money-laundered  from 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

Lawmakers at the national council, the lower house of the Swiss federal assembly, are expected to vote on the matter on Thursday.

The repatriation of corruption money hidden or stashed away overseas from their country of origin and their use to benefit the nationals harmed by such corrupt practices is a principle which has been accepted internationally as a result of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption 2003, which Malaysia signed in Mexico on 9th December 2003 and officially ratified on 24th Sept. 2008.

A highlight of the Convention is the inclusion of a specific chapter on asset recovery, aimed at returning assets to their rightful owners, including countries from which they had been taken illicitly.

Article 35 of the UN  Convention Against Corruption upheld the principle that “entities or persons who have suffered damage as a result of an act of corruption have the right to initiate legal proceedings against those responsible for that damage in order to obtain compensation”.

The motion before the Swiss Parliament reads:

“The Federal Council (cabinet) is instructed to repatriate to its country of origin, at least in part, profits unlawfully obtained in third party countries by the Federal Prosecutor’s Office and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) in accordance to the procedures of the Illegally Acquired Assets Act (SR 196.1) in the countries concerned.”

The motion is triggered by plans to absorb the illicit funds linked to financial crimes like the  1MDB scandal recovered by the Swiss authorities into the Swiss treasury.

This will be against the principle enunciated in the UN Convention Against Corruption, that stolen corruption monies in foreign banks and institutions, like  the stolen 1MDB-linked funds, should be repatriated back to Malaysia to benefit the victims of the 1MDB scandal –  the 30 million Malaysian people.

It would be most inappropriate to return the stolen 1MDB monies to the Government of Malaysia, as it  is directly involved in the 1MDB scandal.

The RM430 million 1MDB-linked funds confiscated from Swiss banks and financial companies should be held in trust for the benefit of the people of Malaysia.

It would also be most improper and morally indefensible for the Swiss government to keep these monies for its own use as it would set bad international precedent in  an era to declare and combat corruption as an international crime.

(Media Statement in Penang on Sunday, 11th March 2018)

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IGP Fuzi had done in six months what his predecessor Khalid Abu Bakar dared not do in five years as IGP – exonerating Jho Low in the 1MDB scandal

The Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun has done  in six months as the top cop in the country what his predecessor Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar had not done in his five years as IGP – exonerating Jho Low in the 1MDB sc scandal.

Why Khalid dare not say in his five years from 2012-2017  as IGP (during the “happening” years of 1MDB scandal)  what  Fuzi said last Wednesday that there is “nothing to link Joh Low with 1MDB”?

Does Fuzi needs a re-education on the 1MDB scandal and Jho Low’s role in it, which has resulted in 3Is for Malaysia – infamy, ignominy and iniquity as a global kleptocracy?

A new book on Jho Low and the 1MDB scandal written by  two Wall Street Journal journalists, entitled  “Billion Dollar Whale: The Man Who Fooled Wall Street, Hollywood, and the World” is coming out, but only in September.

But Fuzi does not need wait six months for the “Billion Dolar Whale” book to come out.

The best and fastest way for Fuzi to get such a re-education is to ask the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak himself or to do some homework by reading up the 251-page 958-paragraph United States Department of Justice (DoJ)’s largest kleptocratic litigation in history with regard to the US$4.5 billion 1MDB international money-laundering scandal!

There is an even easier re-education for Fuzi – to follow the CNBC programme “What happened to 1MDB’s money” on March 1 or the Rachel Maddow Show programme on MSNBC on March 10 (yesterday) on the 1MDB scandal and linkages to the Trump presidency, which featured Najib and his recent visit to White House very prominently.

(Media Statement in Penang on Sunday, 11th  March 2018)

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Najib should return the Constituency Redelineation Report to the Election Commission for it  to rectify failure to fully comply with  constitutional requirements and due process

The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak should return the Constituency Redelineation Report submitted to him by the Election Commission on Friday for the Election Commission to rectify failure to fully comply with constitutional requirements and due process.

The Election Commission has been accused of cheating in the redelineation exercise and failure to comply with the various constitutional requirements when conducting review of the delimitation of constituencies.

The Prime Minister must be mindful of international opinion which are most  wary about attempts to cheat and steal the 14th General Election to be held shortly.

For instance, an international news magazine, the Economist,  published  an  article in the Leaders Section under the headline: “Stop, thief! Malaysia’s PM is about to steal an election”.

It is a shocking and agonising reflection as to how low Malaysia’s international stocks and standing have fallen in the last few years, after Malaysia had catapulted to the stratosphere of a global kleptocracy.

Malaysia however should not be guilty of double kleptocracy – monetary kleptocracy and electoral kleptocracy!

The Economist article said Najib feared that most voters would not vote Barisan Nasional to power again if given a choice, and that Najib is “taking their choice away” by means of gerrymandering,  malapportionment, a fake “fake news” campaign and other undemocratic measures.

Sections 8 and  9 of the Thirteen Schedule of the Constitution which provides for the Election Commission submitting to the Prime Minister its Constituency Redelineation Report did not contemplate the Election Commission violating constitutional requirements and due process when conducting a review of the delimitation of constituencies, in particular the Constitutional requirement that the Election Commission “shall take into consideration any representations duly made” in the constituency delimitation review.

The Election Commision’s action in submitting its  Constituency Redelineation Report to the Prime Minister was premature and unconstitutional  as it  had yet to properly complete the second local enquiry for Selangor.

In February, over 250 objections were filed by voters in Selangor, but the Election Commission has only notified and held local enquiries for 50 groups. The other 200 over objections have yet to be heard.

The 14th General Election is overdue, but this cannot be an excuse for the Election Commission to violate its constitutional mandate to conduct a fair, proper, comprehensive and constitutional review of the delimitation of constituencies and rush to complete and submit its Constituency Redelineation Report in time for the present Parliamentary meeting so that the new constituencies  could be used to save the UMNO/BN coalition from electoral defeat and change of Federal government for first time in the nation’s six-decade history.

As the Election Commission has worked  outside the framework contemplated by the Malaysian Constitution, the Prime Minister should  return the Constituency Redelineation Report submitted to him by the Election Commission on Friday for the Election Commission to rectify failure to fully comply with constitutional requirements and due process.

(Media Statement in Penang on Sunday, 11th March 2018)

                This entry was posted on Sunday, 11 March 2018, 8:43 am and is filed under
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Pakatan Harapan wants to change the national landscape not only in the next five years but the next 10 to 20 years

Today’s launch of the DAP Penang Ubah fleet of 113 vehicles for the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election machinery sounds the bugle of battle for the 14GE – not  a war of cannons, guns or knives but a battle to win the hearts and minds of Malaysians to  exercise their peaceful, democratic and Constitutional right to decide the next Federal Government through the ballot box.

I remember that when I first contested in Tanjong parliamentary constituency 32 years ago in 1986, it was to make the Penang the beach-head for a national campaign to make Malaysia an united, democratic, just, progressive and prosperous nation which would be a model to  the world of how a nation of diverse races, languages and cultures could unite, succeed and prosper.

The last ten years since the political tsunami of 2008 has shown what the DAP-led Pakatan Penang State Government could do to give new hope to the people of Penang that the State could be a world-class centre  in excellence and accomplishments in various fields of human endeavor and not just degenerate into the dirtiest rubbish dump for the region.

The target of the  imminent 14th General Election is Malaysia, and not Penang –   to use Penang as a solid base to restore  hope to Malaysians and to achieve the first change of Federal government in Putrajaya, to start the process to stop the rot in Malaysia which has brought Malaysia to  the lowest ranking of Transparency International Corruption Perception Index  in 23 years and Malaysians  constantly reminded like the FBI seizure of the billion-ringgit luxury superyacht Equanimity in Bali that Malaysia has become a global kleptocracy.

The Pakatan Harapan Manifesto launched on Thursday  was a most powerful rebuttal of the lies, falsehoods and hypocrisies coming from UMNO/BN quarters and their army of quinoa cybertroopers that the Malays will perish if UMNO is defeated.

The Malays in Penang and Selangor, just like the Chinese and Indians, had a better deal under the Pakatan State Governments in the past ten years since 2008 than when under the previous UMNO/BN rule.

Similarly, all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli will have a better life under Pakatan Harapan Federal Government after the 14th General Election as spelt out in the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election Manifesto.

This is because Pakatan Harapan wants to continue as the Federal Government in the 15th and 16th General Elections and in the decades after, and not just for five years after the 14th General Election –  and we are fully conscious that if Pakatan Harapan Federal Government in Putrajaya fails to deliver its promises to all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli, to have a better life, the voters have the right to reject Pakatan Harapan in future general elections and elect a replacement, including UMNO/BN if they are still on the political scene.

In launching the Penang DAP  Ubah fleet of 113 vehicles for the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election machinery, we are embarking on a journey to bring change to the national landscape not only in the next five years but the next 10 to 20 years, where all Malaysians, regardless of race, religion or region, will be proud to be Malaysians.

(Speech at the launching of the DAP Penang Ubah fleet of 113 vehicles for the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election machinery at Jalan  Padang Kota Lama, Penang on Sunday, 11th March 2018 at 5pm)

                This entry was posted on Sunday, 11 March 2018, 7:34 pm and is filed under
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Call on Penang to be the “fixed deposit” state in the Save Malaysia campaign to ensure  Pakatan Harapan wins Putrajaya not only in 14GE but becomes the government for the next 10 to 20 years

We gather tonight to celebrate the tenth anniversary of a  great political change in the “308”  2008 General Election – when  a DAP-led coalition toppled the Barisan Nasional in Penang and went to make Penang a model state for good governance.

But we have two other objectives tonight:

Firstly, to enlarge this political change to the national landscape and declare Pakatan Harapan’s readiness to replace UMNO/Barisan Nasional in Putrajaya in the imminent 14th General Election and form the new Federal Government, which will the first change of Federal Government in the nation’s history since Merdeka in 1957; and

Secondly, to clearly and unequivocally our preparedness to be the Malaysian national government, not just for one term after the 14th General Election, but for many terms in the subsequent general elections.

The Pakatan Harapan Manifesto launched on Thursday  was a most powerful rebuttal of the politics of lies, falsehoods and hypocrisies, creating hatred and animosities among the diverse races and religions in Malaysia,  coming from UMNO/BN quarters and their army of quinoa cybertroopers, e.g. the lie that the Malays will perish if UMNO is defeated.

The Malays in Penang and Selangor, just like the Chinese and Indians, had a better deal under the Pakatan State Governments in the past ten years since 2008 than when under the previous UMNO/BN rule.

Similarly, all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli will have a better life under Pakatan Harapan Federal Government after the 14th General Election as spelt out in the Pakatan Harapan 14th General Election Manifesto.

This is because Pakatan Harapan wants to continue as the Federal Government in the 15th and 16th General Elections and in the decades after, and not just for five years after the 14th General Election –  and we are fully conscious that if Pakatan Harapan Federal Government in Putrajaya fails to deliver its promises to all Malaysians, whether Malays, Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans or Orang Asli, to have a better life, the voters have the right to reject Pakatan Harapan in future general elections and elect a replacement, including UMNO/BN if they are still on the political scene.

I therefore call on Penang to be the “fixed deposit” state in the Save Malaysia campaign to ensure  Pakatan Harapan wins Putrajaya not only in 14GE but becomes the government for the next 10 to 20 years so that Malaysia can be a  show-case to the world of how unity, tolerance and harmony in a plural nation with diverse races, religions and cultures could become a world-class nation of success, development and prosperity instead of becoming  a failed, rogue and kleptocratic state.

(Speech at the Pakatan Harapan Penang State Government 10th Anniversary Celebration Ceramah at Padang Kota Lama, Penang on Sunday, 11th March 2018 at 10 pm)

                This entry was posted on Monday, 12 March 2018, 10:55 am and is filed under
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Challenge to IGP Fuzi to quote chapter and verse from the PAC Report on 1MDB which states that there is ‘nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB” or that Najib had not committed any crime in the 1MDB scandal!

For the past five  days, informed and concerned Malaysians must have felt very uneasy and uncomfortable, as if  a bone  is stuck in the throat, with the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun’s ridiculous statement that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB”?

I challenge Fuzi to quote chapter and verse from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Report on 1MDB, submitted to Parliament in April 2016 which states that there is “nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB” or that Najib had not committed any crime in the 1MDB scandal.

This is because Fuzi had used the PAC report to reinforce his contention that there is nothing to link Jho Low with 1MDB” and the PAC Report has been used by those in power to cover a multitude of sins in the world’s worst kleptoracy, claiming that the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak had not commited any crime in the 1MDB scandal.

I stand corrected, but as far as I can remember, there is no mention of Jho Low whatsoever in the PAC Report.  Just compare the PAC Report with the 251-page 958-paragraph United States Department of Justice’s (DoJ) kleptocratic litigation under the US Kleptocratic Assets Recovery Initiative 2000 on the US4.5 billion 1MDB funds stolen and money-laundered in various countries, including the United States, United Kingdom, Switzerland and Singapore, which is studded with references to Jho Low all over the litigation.

Such a comparison will highlight why the PAC Report is a faulty document. The whole world knows about the linkage between Jho Loh and 1MDB – in fact we can state without fear of contradiction that without Jho Loh, there would be no 1MDB.

The best person to know and testify to  this would be the Prime Minister himself. All it needs for IGP Fuzi to do to resolve this vexed question is to meet Najib and ask him whether Jho Loh had links with 1MDB. Has Fuzi or the Police asked Najib this simple question? If not, why not!

The very fact that the PAC Report on 1MDB  has no mention about Jho Low is an indictment on the comprehensiveness, veracity and accuracy  of the PAC inquiry into the 1MDB, and why there is a need for the PAC rectify this major defect and hold a comprehensive inquiry into Jho Low’s role in the 1MDB scandal.

Will the PAC conduct such an inquiry?

One question I want to specifically ask Fuzi is whether he had  read the US DoJ’s kleptocratic litigation proceedings?

Does he need to be pointed out the relevant parts of the 251-page 958-paragraph US DoJ kleptocratic litigation proceedings where Jho Low was  specifically mentioned as the mastermind in the international conspiracy in the five years from 2009 to 2014 where billions of US dollars were fraudulently diverted from 1MDB through various means, including by defrauding foreign banks and by money-laundering the proceeds of the criminal conduct including “in and through US financial institutions”?

Is Fuzi unaware that two Wall Street Journal journalists will release their book on Jho Low and 1MDB in September with the title “Billion Dollar Whale: The Man Who Fooled Wall Street, Hollywood, and the World”?

Surely Fuzi is aware of the book publisher’s note on Amazon.com, promising that the book will be  an “epic true-tale of hubris and greed”, revealing “how  a young social climber pulled off one of the biggest financial heists in history – right under the nose of the global financial industry – exposing the shocking secret nexus of elite wealth, banking, Hollywood, and politics”?

Or has the denial complex, that there is nothing to link Jho Low with the 1MDB scandal, become a required position for all the top holders of public office in Malaysia whether the Police, the Attorney-General’s Chambers, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Bank Negara, the Judiciary  and even for  the Parliament Speaker?

(Media Conference Statement in in Parliament on Monday, 12th March 2018 at 12 noon)

                This entry was posted on Monday, 12 March 2018, 11:46 am and is filed under
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The  Prime Minister should not table the Election Commission’s unconstitutional  Constituency Redelineation Report in Parliament or ask for a vote  until  outcome of judicial challenges that Election Commission had not fully complied with constitutional requirements

The Cabinet at its weekly meeting tomorrow should decide that the Prime Minister should not table the Election Commission’s unconstitutional  Constituency Redelineation Report in Parliament or ask for a vote  until the  outcome of judicial challenges that Election Commission had not fully complied with constitutional requirements.

This follows the announcement by Bersih Acting Chairman Shahrul Aman Mohd Saari that several voters in Selangor who were denied the right to be heard by the Election Commission during the second public enquiry had filed actions in court.

It is indeed most shocking and outrageous that the Election Commission has rushed to present the Constituency Redelineation Report to the Prime Minister for “lightning” approval by the current meeting of  the Dewan Rakyat although the Election Commission had not complied with the constitutional requirements in the review of delimitation of constituencies, as the Election Commisison had not completed the second local enquiry for Selangor with  over 200 voters in Selangor who had filed objections who have yet to be heard.

If the Election Commission is to fully comply with constitutional requirements, the new redelineation of constituencies will not  be in time to be used for the 14th General Elections if Parliament is to be dissolved in the next month or so.

The priority of the Election Commission is to comply with the Constitutional requirements and mandate and not to meet the election timetable of the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

The Election Commission has acted unconstitutionally. The question is whether the Prime Minister and the Cabinet would follow suit and also act unconstitutionally in presenting the Election Commission’s unconstitutional Constituency Redelineation Report to Parliament and to ask for a vote of approval in the current meeting of Parliament.

I call on Najib to show that he upholds the Constitution, and would not be a party to any violation of the Constitution, and that if he wants to dissolve Parliament and hold the 14th General Elections within the next 65 days, the present constituency redelineation would be used instead.

(Media Statement in Parliament on  Tuesday, 13th March 2018)

                This entry was posted on Tuesday, 13 March 2018, 7:08 pm and is filed under
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Why is Najib keeping silent and not instituting defamation proceedings although he had been publicly called a “thief” by two international media, the Economist and MSNBC, within two days?

In the first time in 61 years of the nation’s history, the Prime Minister of the country has been publicly been called a “thief”, not once, but twice within two days, by two international media organisations on completely different issues.

One was the international weekly magazine, the Economist  which on 8th March, 2018, carried an article titled “Stop, thief! Malaysia’s PM is about to steal an election”.

The report alleged that  Datuk Seri Najib Razak feared that most voters would not vote BN to power again if given a choice, and is “taking their choice away” by means of gerrymandering and malapportionment, among other tactics.

It cited the 1MDB scandal, in which US authorities say billions of ringgit have been misused, as the main point of argument.

The article said: “In most countries, a government that allowed US$4.5 billion to go missing from a state development agency would struggle to win re-election.

“If some US$681 million had appeared in the prime minister’s personal account around the same time, which he breezily explained away as a gift from an unnamed admirer, the task would be all the harder.

“An apparent cover-up, involving the dismissal of officials investigating, or merely complaining about the scandal, might be the last straw for voters. But in Malaysian elections, alas, voters do not count for much.”

The article continued: “Faced with the risk of losing power, the government is rigging the system even more brazenly. Parliament will soon vote on new constituency boundaries. The proposed map almost guarantees Najib another term, despite his appalling record.”

It noted that “the practice (malapportionment) is so unfair that it is illegal in most countries, including Malaysia, where the constitution says that electoral districts must be ‘approximately equal’ in size”.

The next day, on March 9, the American television host Rachel Maddow of MSNBC news programme also called Najib a thief in her  “The Rachel Maddow Show”.

Maddow made detailed mention of the 1MDB scandal from the time of the “Arab donation” matter to the latest developments including  Indonesian/FBI seizure of Jho Low’s billion ringgit luxury superyacht  Equanimity in Bali last week and the  Wall Street Journal report on its review of a cache of emails which revealed that an aide and  donor of US President Donald Trump had asked for US$75 million from 1MDB mastermind Jho Low to get the US DoJ to drop its 1MDB investigations.

The following is a transcript from the Rachel Maddow Show last Friday:

This new yacht that you own is a $250 million yacht. It`s called “The Equanimity.” It has now been seized by the FBI, by U.S. federal agents, and is being handed over to the U.S. government.

So congratulations, U.S. taxpayer! Hope you like your new boat.

I should also tell you that this week, you also just became the proud owner of $60 million worth of proceeds that were earned by the film “Wolf of Wall Street.” The producers of the movie have now surrendered $60 million of what that film made to the U.S. government. So you own those proceeds now too.

You apparently are also about to become the owner of some of the proceeds of the movie “Daddy`s Home” starring Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg, and you are also about to become the owner of some of the proceeds from the movie “Dumb and Dumber 2” which stars a car that looks like a dog.

In the case of those two movies, though, unlike “Wolf of Wall Street,” where we know it`s $60 million that you`re getting, I don`t know exactly how much of the proceeds you are about to get from “Dumb and Dumber 2”, and the dad one, but you`re about to get some of it as a U.S. taxpayer. And the reason you are now the owner of all of this new stuff you didn`t own before is because of this guy. Not the one on the left, the other guy, who is the prime minister of Malaysia.

If you are the prime minister of a country and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars suddenly show up in your personal bank account, you better have a really good explanation for that, right? I mean, prime minister jobs do tend to come with a nice salary, but not hundreds of millions of dollars overnight kind of salary.

A couple of years ago, though, somebody put almost $700 million into the bank account of the prime minister of Malaysia. And he really had no good explanation for it. For months, he just said it was nobody`s business. It was his money.

He said these allegations, these insinuations that there was anything inappropriate about the sudden infusion of $700 million into his private bank account, he said this was just his political opponents trying to undermine him, there was nothing to see here. Then his own attorney general and his deputy prime minister started saying, actually, you know, maybe the prime minister should answer questions about this mysterious $700 million. The prime minister reacted to that by firing both of them. He fired his deputy prime minister and he fired his attorney general.

The prime minister then appointed a new attorney general to look at the circumstances of that money turning up in his bank account, and that new hand-picked attorney general looked into it and declared that really it was all fine. Nobody had done anything wrong.

And that`s when they decided what their public explanation would be for where the money came from. The explanation was that that money, that $700 million, it was a present. It was a no-strings-attached gift for the prime minister from the Saudi royal family. Their line was that there was a Saudi prince who decided that he liked the prime minister of Malaysia, and no occasion really, he just decided that the prime minister could probably do with $700 million, so he gave it to him. Free for nothing.

When that`s your good-sounding explanation, when that`s your “everything is fine, nothing to see here” excuse that a Saudi prince dropped it off and we don`t know why, if that`s the good sounding explanation, you know the bad-sounding explanation must be really, really, really bad.

Well, sure enough, a few months later the United States Department of Justice filed a 250-page complaint alleging that that $700 million cash that turned up mysteriously in the personal bank account of the Malaysian prime minister, that was just a fraction of the proceeds of a gigantic heist. A giant act of thievery, a corruption scheme, in which the prime minister and his family and his associates stole billions of dollars from the Malaysian government, $4.5 billion they stole in cash from the Malaysian government. And some of it they just stacked up in bank accounts, but mostly they laundered it all over the world, including in the United States, which is why the U.S. Justice Department brought the case even though the money was stolen from the people of Malaysia.

And the list of stuff that they spent the stolen money on is a ridiculous list of stuff. The prime minister`s family and friends – they bought penthouses in New York City. They bought mansions in Beverly Hills. They bought yachts, yes, yachts, Barry White style and otherwise. They bought Picasso paintings. They did a lot of gambling.

The prime minister`s wife mysteriously ended up with a lot of ridiculous Jewelry. The prime minister`s step-son used a bunch of the money to finance some Hollywood movies, including “The Wolf of Wall Street,” “Daddy`s Home” and “Dumb and Dumber 2” all through a company called Red Granite Pictures. If you actually watch the trailers for any of those Hollywood movies, you`ll see a splash page at the beginning of all those trailers for Red Granite Pictures.

U.S. Justice Department says that was the money laundering vehicle for some of these gazillions of dollars that were stolen from the Malaysian government by the prime minister, his family and their associates.

And yes, that`s sort of a bonkers list of things to spend money on, particularly if you are trying to stay low-key and get away with this kind of theft, right? Ostentatious much? But in a way, if you think about it, you sort of have to spend the money on something. It is hard to explain hundreds of billions of dollars, let alone billions of dollars just sitting in bank accounts. Maybe it`s better to convert it into real-world salable assets, converted even into assets that might make a profit. If “Dumb and Dumber 2” is anywhere near as good as the original, it might be a great investment.

Well, now, the United States has started the process of seizing the assets that are believed to have been bought by the criminals who carried off the scheme. The stuff that was stolen with Malaysian government money, U.S. federal official, the FBI, started last summer going after the real estate. They made Leonardo DiCaprio hand over the Picasso that he was given as a gift by the good people who turned up with barrels full of cash to finance “The Wolf of Wall Street.” And the Justice Department has continued to pursue its investigation into this huge heist, this massive theft of billions of dollars in government funds, which ended up resulting in the purchase of all of these things.

So, a few things here. Number one, congratulations on your new yacht. It is lovely! Even to the point where it`s attractive. Two, yes, it was strange when President Trump hosted the Malaysian prime minister at the White House just a few months ago, in September, in the middle of this big investigation. White House never mentioned the federal agents who were pursuing the Malaysian prime minister as a multi-billion dollar thief in this gigantic scheme.

There was actually worry in advance of the Malaysian prime minister visiting Trump that, if on this trip to the White House, the prime minister`s wife wore some specific jewelry she is known to possess, federal agents might be put in the awkward position of having to take that jewelry off her, like maybe when she was leaving the White House grounds, or maybe at their hotel. Naturally, the Malaysian prime minister and his entourage, including his wife, all stayed at our president`s hotel in Washington while they were for that visit, which means that government funds that rightfully belong to the people of Malaysian have now gone into the pocket of the Malaysian prime minister himself but also into the pocket of our president. Nice. No wonder they get along so well.

So, the ongoing Justice Department investigation and the seizure of all these luxury items bought with the stolen funds, that makes that White House visit a little weird. Now, it`s getting weirder because the “Wall Street Journal” has obtained documents, e-mails, that appear to show that a top Republican fundraiser close to President Donald Trump was in negotiations to earn tens of millions of dollars if the Justice Department dropped the investigation into the graft scandal involving a Malaysian state investment fund.

I should tell you, the specific businessman we`re talking about here who they were trying to set up some sort of contract with, he is the guy who is technically the owner of your new yacht, “The Equanimity,” this yacht that FBI agents just seized in this case. FBI agents have found the yacht, but the guy himself who is technically the owner, who is allegedly part of this big theft scheme with the prime minister, that guy has gone missing.

And they are now looking for him right now. But according to the “Wall Street Journal,” within the last year, these e-mails that “The Journal” obtained show that a Trump fundraiser was pursuing a draft business agreement with that guy, the guy who is now a fugitive, right, the guy who owns the yacht and cannot be found. Elliott Broidy and his wife were pursuing a deal in which he and his wife would get paid a cool $75 million if they were able to succeed in getting the Justice Department to drop this Malaysian case.

This is weird, right? This massive corruption case, massive heist, multi billion-bar scheme and Trump is hosting the prime minister at the center of it, in the middle of this big case by the Justice Department?

And the main business guy who also seems to have benefited from it, at least it got him a $250 million yacht, he is involved with one of Trump`s fundraisers who are asking for a $75 million payment to get the U.S. Justice Department to drop this case against him. It`s a strange story, right? Who knows where this one ends?

Will Najib sue?  Will the Malaysian Prime Minister clear his own name and reputation, if not for his own sake, at least for the sake of the Malaysian nation and 30 million Malaysians?

It is not only the US, Australian, British,   European and other international media which have been reporting about the 1MDB scandal, even Asean media, with Indonesia’s leading current affairs magazine Tempo highlighting  the 1MDB scandal and the cover-up by the Malaysian government, despite ongoing investigations by various foreign authorities.

In its latest edition, the weekly publication featured the 1MDB scandal on its front page – with a caricature of businessperson Jho Low on board the Equanimity – and in several articles within, including one headlined “Smooth outside, stalled inside.”

It noted that investigations by Malaysian authorities conducted over the past three years have not resulted in any charges brought against individuals linked to the state investment fund.

“Nine other countries investigating this corruption case have found facts that contradicted the Malaysian government’s claims.

“The FBI has established links between businessperson Jho Low and 1MDB, and even concluded that the Equanimity was bought using money raised from 1MDB bonds,” Tempo said in its report.

The question Malaysians must ask is whether Malaysia has become a double global kleptocracy,  firstly because of the 1MDB scandal and secondly, as charged by The Economist, because of the theft of the impending 14th General Election.

Najib cannot continue to behave as if he has eyes that see not, ears that hear not and mouth that speaks not! He has no option but to clear his own name and that of the nation.

(Media Conference Statement  in Parliament on Tuesday, 13th March 2018 at 11 am)

                This entry was posted on Tuesday, 13 March 2018, 12:40 pm and is filed under
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