Archive for July 6th, 2017

Father of modern Malaysia backs jailed former deputy in attempt to oust PM

Posted by Kit in Anwar Ibrahim, Mahathir, Najib Razak on Thursday, 6 July 2017

Randeep Ramesh
Guardian
6 July 2017

Mahathir Mohamad says former deputy Anwar Ibrahimm, jailed on charges of sodomy, should be freed to contest election against scandal-ridden Najib

Mahathir Mohamad, the father of modern Malaysia, is backing the man he sacked as his deputy and saw imprisoned on charges of sodomy to be prime minister, in an attempt to unseat the scandal-ridden incumbent.

In a remarkable political U-turn ahead of a general election next year, Mahathir now says that his former protege Anwar Ibrahim, Malaysia’s most famous political prisoner and its most charismatic public figure, ought to be released from jail and allowed to contest parliamentary elections.

Human rights groups have long said the allegations against Anwar are politically motivated attempts by his opponents, including Mahathir and the current prime minister Najib Razak, to silence him.

Speaking to the Guardian on a visit to London, Mahathir, who in power was accused of being an autocrat, said Anwar is a victim of a political vendetta and that a new administration would seek a royal pardon to allow him to re-enter politics.

Anwar’s lawyers are currently seeking to get him released after evidence emerged that suggested an impartial government-appointed prosecutor was paid a sum equivalent to £2m from a bank account controlled by the prime minister. Read the rest of this entry »

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Does Prime Minister Najib know that he is the”MO1” referred to in the US DOJ lawsuits to forfeit US$1.7 billion 1MDB-linked assets money-laundered through American banks?

Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Media, Najib Razak on Thursday, 6 July 2017

I am quite impressed. Two page headline leads face-to-face on page 12 and page 13 in the New Straits Times (NST) – the page 12 headline lead “KIT SIANG’S RETIREMENT OFFER A ‘DIVERSION’” for a three-column report while page 13 headline lead “’KIT SIANG A HYPOCRITE’” for a four-column report.

I have never received such coverage by the self-proclaimed national mainstream newspaper before. Why have I suddenly become so important?

Pity, I am not one of NST fans.

Even greater pity that such prominent coverage comes at a time when the NST has degenerated from a newspaper into a lies-paper, with its formidable circulation in the region of 300,000 copies a day in the past shrinking to the pitiable figure of some 40,000 actually sold circulation today!

But the mission of NST, just like other media in the UMNO/BN stable, is not to report news but to disseminate lies, fake news and false information and there are many such lies, fake news and false information in the two mentioned NST reports today. Read the rest of this entry »

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Congrats to Najib in getting Hadi to be his chief defender on 1MDB scandal as the PAS President himself is worth more than the phalanx of overly-paid local and foreign and media consultants and propagandists

Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak, PAS on Thursday, 6 July 2017

I congratulate the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, for getting Datuk Seri Hadi Awang to be his chief defender on the international multi-billion dollar 1MDB money-laundering scandal as the PAS President himself is worth more than the phalanx of overly-paid local and foreign media consultants and propagandists.

On the eve of Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Hadi issued an extraordinary Open Letter to all Political Parties asking all political leaders to ease up on their attacks on Najib on the 1MDB scandal, introducing the ridiculous notion that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) kleptocratic lawsuits to forfeit US$1.7 billion 1MDB-linked assets which had been acquired through stolen 1MDB funds money-laundered through American banks as “foreign interference” in Malaysian domestic affairs.

Yesterday, Hadi came out with another novel defence of Najib and the 1MDB scandal, claiming that the 1MDB scandal is a consequence of Barisan Nasional’s motto of “leadership by example” over the years, as good as arguing that just because there had been scandals in the past, Malaysians should not object to another scandal – even though the 1MDB scandal is the greatest financial scandal in the nation’s history and given Malaysia the infamous and ignominous appellation of a “global kleptocracy”!

On this basis, Hadi will be able to defend and justify all the abuses and corruption of power by the Najib government.

Is this the basis on which Hadi wants PAS to defend and even save Najib and UMNO? Read the rest of this entry »

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