The Minister for Multimedia and Communications, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak cannot be more wrong when he accused the whistleblower site Sarawak Report of misleading the public on the auditor-general’s report on 1MDB unless he is also challenging the veracity and integrity of the Auditor-General’s findings.
It is significant that Salleh is not suggesting that Sarawak Report had presented a false, fraudulent or fictitious account of the AG’s Report on 1MDB.
This means that Salleh accepts that the Sarawak Report’s leaks are based on the true and genuine version of the AG’s Report on the 1MDB.
Can Salleh state what are the findings in the AG’s Report which he or the Najib administration is rejecting or is he impying that he does not question the veracity and integrity of the AG’s findings on 1MDB but does not want the AG’s Report to be made public and that it should continue to be classified under the Official Secrets Act because it would be too incriminating for the Prime Minister?
This is a most ludicrous and untenable position and shows that the Najib government has a lot of things to hide, and revives my question yesterday, whether the AG’s Report on 1MDB is kept under wraps because its publication would lead to Najib’s downfall as Prime Minister and UMNO President, as he would have lost all credibility and qualifications to continue as the country’s Prime Minister and President of UMNO?
Salleh said that the AG’s findings were only one component which made up the final report on 1MDB, which was done by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and “not the final report on 1MDB”.
DAP MP for PJ Utara and PAC member, Tony Pua, has shot into smithereens this claim by Salleh, when Pua said in his statement today that the AG’s Report wasn’t merely “one aspect” of 1MDB but “an integral part of the PAC Report on 1MDB, without which the PAC Report would be incomplete”.
Pua said: “The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in its proceedings, relies almost entirely on the findings of the AG Report to present its deliberations, conclusions and recommendations. In fact, the PAC members understood that the AG’s Report was to be presented together with the PAC Report to provide a complete picture with detailed facts and figures to the Parliament.
“Hence The PAC Report itself made extensive references to the findings AG’s Report without citing the details for the simple reason that the PAC was expecting the AG’s Report to be published together with the PAC Report.”
Pua added:
“Datuk Seri Salleh Keruak must also accept the fact that there was nothing in the PAC Report which contradicted or negated the findings of the AG’s Report. In fact, PAC members from the government backbench and opposition concurred fully with the AG’s Report and never at any point of time, as recorded in the PAC Hansard, disagreed or rejected the findings.
“Hence all the findings in the AG’s Report must be deemed factual and dealt with accordingly by the authorities. The question of the AG’s Report being ‘incomplete’ does not arise at all.”
Would the PAC Chairman Datuk Seri Hasan Arifin or any PAC member dispute Pua’s assertions that firstly, the AG’s Report on 1MDB was meant to be “an integral part of the PAC Report on 1MDB, without which the PAC Report would be incomplete”; secondly, that the PAC in its proceedings, relied almost entirely on the findings of the AG’s Report to present its deliberations, conclusions and recommendations; and thirdly, that PAC members from the government backbench and opposition concurred fully with the AG’s Report and never at any point of time, as recorded in the PAC Hansard, disagreed or rejected the findings?
Salleh is also wrong in asserting that the PAC Report on 1MDB is the complete, final and conclusive report on 1MDB, as the PAC is only a committee of Parliament which is delegated the responsibility to inquire into the 1MDB scandal – and the final decision whether the PAC Report is satisfactory and complete must come from Parliament through a resolution after debate on a motion to accept or reject the PAC Report on 1MDB.
However, Malaysian Parliament must be the first Parliament in the world where it is denied of the “full and integral” PAC Report on 1MDB, where the AG’s Report on 1MDB which should be an appendix or attachment to the PAC Report was omitted on the grounds of Official Secrets Act – a most unprecedented denial of information to MPs to frustrate them from making a proper judgment on the PAC Report on 1MDB!