Malaysiakini
20 Dec 2016

Lim Kit Siang has bombarded Communications and Multimedia Minister Salleh Said Keruak with a barrage of questions

This is after the minister questioned whether the opposition could come up with a shadow cabinet and also asked that the opposition explain what it would do if PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim cannot become prime minister.

However, Lim pointed out that Salleh was raising a spree of questions when the minister himself has not been answering for the government’s alleged scandals and failings.

“If there is any ministry which is assigned the responsibility of defending the government, it is Salleh’s ministry.

“But realising that much as he wanted, he is just incapable of defending the indefensible, Salleh is subtly trying to transform his ministerial portfolio of answering questions on behalf of the government into one of asking questions about the opposition.

“If Salleh expects answers to his questions, let him perform his ministerial duty to answer questions about government scandals and failings,” he said.

The veteran leader then proceeded to bombard Salleh with questions on a daily basis since last Sunday.

The following are 15 verbatim questions which Lim had posed:

Question 1: Why the government’s conspiracy of silence over the international multi-billion dollar 1MDB kleptocratic money-laundering scandal when there is breaking news all over the world several times a week for the past many months about it.

Question 2: Can Salleh explain and justify the shameful conduct of the Malaysian Parliament and the Umno general assembly in failing their national responsibility to rebut and refute Malaysia’s international ignominy and infamy of being regarded worldwide as a “global kleptocracy”?

Question 3: Was Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak or Umno/BN government responsible for the expensive, glossy and multi-coloured 20-page publication, entitled “1MDB pasca Laporan Audit Negara dan PAC – Saman DOJ Meragukan” distributed as an anonymous booklet at the Umno general assembly?

Question 4: Why the prime minister and Umno president had acted in a most irresponsible manner when through his Umno presidential speech on Nov 30, he launched a Nazi-style “Big Lies” propaganda offensive against the political opposition, plunging Malaysian politics into an era of fake news, false cartoons and fake allegations.

Question 5: Can Salleh explain why the Malaysian government tried to cheat in Programme for International Student Assessment 2015 (Pisa 2015), regarded as the world’s school report, resulting in Malaysia’s exclusion and disqualification from the official Pisa 2015 rankings – one of three countries to suffer such shame and ignominy in Pisa 2015?

Question 6: Would Salleh agree that the corruption at the Sabah Water Department, for which no one has yet been charged in court for corruption, is proof that Malaysia is not serious about combating corruption, even less so with regard to grand corruption affecting top political and government leaders.

Question 7: Does Salleh agree with former finance minister Daim Zainuddin’s call for a key planning unit, the Special Economic Committee, set up by the prime minister in August last year, to be replaced, saying it has failed.

Question 8: Does Salleh agree that the police and the Attorney-General should stop selective prosecution and discriminatory law enforcement?

Question 9: Does Salleh agree that based on the statements by two Umno leaders Jamil Khir Baharom and Ahmad Maslan, there is a political conspiracy between Umno and PAS not only against the various state governments but also against the other 13 component parties in the BN to support PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang’s private member’s bill to amend the Syariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act (Act 355).

Question 10: Does Salleh agree with the refusal of the Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai to support immediate expansion plans for Penang International Airport although it is bursting at its seams having reached 6.5 million air passenger traffic capacity in 2016 instead of in 2020.

Question 11: Can Salleh explain the unending reverberations in other countries of the roiling international 1MDB kleptocratic money-laundering scandal, when the Malaysian government continues with its pretence that there is nothing wrong with 1MDB.

Question 12: Would Salleh agree that the Court of Appeal’s acquittal of student activist Muhammad Safwan Anang of his sedition conviction is most welcome and encouraging.

Question 13: Does Salleh agree that Malaysia, whether cabinet, Parliament, the civil society or the citizenry cannot accept with complacency and equanimity the epithet of a global kleptocracy?

Question 14: Would Salleh raise the PISA 2015 issue at tomorrow’s Cabinet meeting, and tell the Education Minister Mahdzir Khalid that there is no need for the ministry to crack its head to invent a cock-and-bull story but to just tell the truth.

Question 15: Would Salleh raise the recent spate of international disasters and tragedies… so that Malaysia can learn the right lessons from such catastrophes and not allow the politics of race, religion and hate to continue to polarise, poison and divide multi-racial, multi-religious, multi-lingual and multi-cultural Malaysia?