What a Shame, Fellow Malaysians

August 6, 2015

We should be in shame but we are not. The majority of us can be bought by Najib using state money for a piddly sum of RM500, for which we told to be grateful to an openly corrupt Prime Minister. Are we that cheap? Obviously, some of us are, especially UMNO members and supporters with their leaders taking a big share of the loot.

Public servants are being harassed by the men in Blue Black uniforms led by a fawning Inspector-General of Police for doing their duty. Yet we have not a word from the Chief Secretary of the Government.

Chief Secretary to Malaysian Government

One would have expected a certain Ali Hamsa to stand up for the public service and take a tough stand on harassment by the Royal Malaysian Police of MACC officials. In stead,  Mr. Hamsa becomes a stooge of the corrupt Najib. He was the man who delivered a message to Attorney-General Gani Patail  to the effect that the latter has been fired, in total disregard of Article 145  of the Malaysian Constitution.

The Governor, Dr Zeti Aziz of Bank Negara Malaysia, too is being dragged into the mud,  and her staff are accused of leaking vital information on Najib’s personal banks accounts (and Rosmah Mansor’s as well).

Politicians like my MP Tony Pua (DAP) and my young and brave friend MP Rafizi Ramli (PKR) were summoned to Bukit Aman for questioning and  the former had his passport taken away from him. For attempting to get to the bottom of  the 1MDB scandal and the RM2.6 billion Najib heist of  state funds, they and our public officials were treated  like common criminals.

Even activist Clare Rewcastle Brown was not spared from being hounded by our Police for her Sarawak Report revelations on 1MBD and the Najib bank accounts. On attempts by our authorities to have her extradited to Malaysia, she  has this to say:

“I have been asked for response on this latest move by the Malaysian authorities to attempt to extradite me by issuing a warrant for my arrest, which they say they will pass to Interpol.

My first comment is that this action could hardly be more counter-productive on the part of a government that is seeking to assure the world that it is a sane democracy.

My action has been to publish information, which some in power do not like. Yet, the ‘crime’ they are accusing me of is of “an activity detrimental to democracy”. It is they who are being detrimental to democracy by suppressing free speech and arresting people for questioning people in authority.

I am still unclear whether the agents of the Prime Minister are accusing me of “forging false documents” or obtaining documents through “criminal leakages”, since they have simultaneously accused me of both in the past few days and have been rounding up all sorts of senior investigators who try and find out who might have passed me such leaks.

They need to make up their minds about this before they bring their charges and they really ought to produce some substantive and convincing evidence of their other accusation that I am part of some international plot intent on falsely accusing the Prime Minister of crimes for reasons unknown.

I am merely an investigative journalist who has been doing my job, by unraveling one hell of an international scandal involving people in high places and the grand larceny of public monies.

It’s as simple as that – no plot and no vested interest. The interest of the public is my motivation and duty. Conversely, the public are at liberty to reach their own conclusions over what has motivated the recent actions of the Prime Minister of Malaysia, who has spent the past few days, sacking, removing and arresting just about anybody who has been officially engaged in investigating the scandal I have been reporting on – the missing billions from 1MDB. Moreover, he has not just attacked my blog and myself, but other reputable news organisations, closing down two papers in Malaysia.

If the Prime Minister had nothing to hide in this matter and if my reports were false there would be numerous more orthodox and far less disruptive methods of dealing with me than sacking his Deputy Prime Minister; sacking the A-G; closing down the PAC and dismissing members of his cabinet. He could simply have issued libel proceedings or he could have produced evidence (e.g. correct bank statements and transfer documents) that would have shown my reports to be untrue.”

Clare has more guts than Hamsa Ali and all the top civil servants put together.

Our credibility is at an all time low, so low that even families of MH37o air crash who lost their loved ones, especially those in China, refused to accept  the statement that “Malaysia Airlines would like to sincerely convey our deepest sorrow to the families and friends of the passengers on board Flight MH370 on the news that the flaperon found on Reunion Island on July 29 is indeed from Flight MH370”. Why? We have been lying and cheating too often. –Din Merican

Malaysia: A Nation devoid of Ethics and Decency

by Stephen Ng@www.malaysiakini.com

COMMENT: Several years ago, a ‘pakcik’ at a stall near my house pointed to the news flashes on Buletin Utama while talking with me, and asked: “See what kind of values we are passing on to our next generation!”

He was referring to how, during the lead-up to the last general election, a group of politically-motivated individuals were tearing up some posters in front of the television camera. That was during the heat of the general election.

Today, I am seeing a different set of problems. Based on the latest statements by the special operations division director of Malaysian Anti-Corruption Agency (MACC), Bahri Mohamad Zain, it appears to me that we are fast descending into becoming a nation that no longer knows how to differentiate white from the black and right from wrong.

What is happening?

Bahri’s (photo) team was working round-the-clock to investigate SRC International Sdn Bhd “day and night since fasting month”.

The former 1MDB subsidiary came under the spotlight when exposes were made that RM42 million had ended up in Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak’s bank accounts between late last year and February this year.

Instead of pursuing the main culprit, they are now being hunted down. Bahri and his team have become the victim of a counter-investigation into the so-called ‘criminal leak’ of a draft charge sheet purportedly for Najib with regard to the SRC case.

The present Attorney-General Mohamed Apandi Ali had dismissed that the charge sheet was false, but DAP’s Tony Pua has asked how can then could it be a “criminal leak”?

Meanwhile, Bahri’s men have been ‘arrested’, but Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar calls it differently; at the very least, the MACC investigators are being hindered from carrying out their task, after certain documents and laptops belonging to the team had been confiscated by the Police.

Bahri is quoted as saying that Police actions have affected their probe into SRC International, which is in violation of Section 48 of the MACC Act.

From the perspectives of the rakyat, I personally wonder what is happening to our nation. Are we becoming morally corrupt and bankrupt at the same time? Do we no longer have a conscience to help us to differentiate between right and wrong? What legacy do we want to leave to our children and future generations of Malaysians? Most of us are old, and there is little that we can do. It is ultimately the younger generation of Malaysians who would have to stand up and be counted.

Investigators now being hunted and smeared

There are also attempts by certain unknown parties trying to try to smear the reputation of investigators such as Bank Negara governor Zeti Aziz (photo) and her deputy Nor Shamsiah Mohd Yunus, MACC’s Deputy Chief Commissioner (Operations) Mohd Shukri Abdull, Sarawak Report portal owner Clare Rewcastle-Brown, The Edge media owner Tong Kooi Ong and its publisher Ho Kay Tat.

Strangely, an (apparently partisan) portal has named the press secretary of Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Sufi Yusof  as one of the 13 alleged conspirators, but chose not to mention the former Prime Minister himself. This is probably because of the obvious fear that it would cause huge repercussions.

What I see is that suddenly the graft-busters have become the victims and being accused of conspiring. They become the ‘hunted’ under a section of the law that ironically should be used against those who try to remain in the corridors of power despite losing the people’s support.

In the same blog which is currently being ‘built up’ to look like another whistleblower site, even the brother of Najib,  Nazir Abdul Razak, has come under attack. In short, anyone who is a critic of the present administration becomes a victim of smear campaign.

I suspect soon, the site will be given its prominence by certain parties and appear to be the whistleblower website that all Malaysians look up to. I am told it is not only one site, but several in the offing. The attempts are obvious – to turn white into black and black into grey.

Complaining about corruption

Malaysians are always complaining that corruption has become part of our culture. It is not true that nothing can be done to purge the corrupt in our corridors of power.

The nation is in its rebirth pangs. As we hope to see a new Malaysia emerging, and becoming strong and competitive globally, what is really comforting is that in Malaysia, we still have many like Bahri and his men. I quote Bahri, who said: “You may have (political) powers, but I have Allah.” With Bahri, I stand. Will you do the same? It is now or never.