Archive for category Corruption
Reminder to UMNO leaders and strategists that they have yet to accuse the DAP as being funded and directed by the Jews in their baseless onslaught on DAP during the three phases before, during and after UMNO General Assembly
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Mahathir, Najib Razak, UMNO on Monday, 5 December 2016
UMNO leaders and strategists have launched a major publicity onslaught on the DAP in the three phases before, during and after the UMNO General Assembly last weekend, an offensive ala-Nazi “Big Lie” propaganda which is not only baseless, but downright vicious, vindictive and vengeful, lies such as:
1. That the 14th General Elections will be a contest between UMNO and DAP;
2. That the DAP is anti-Malay or anti-Islam.
3. The “nightmares” Malay will suffer if UMNO loses power in the next general elections.
But the UMNO “Big Lie” propaganda offensive against DAP is grounded on lies, as evident from the fact that the Prime Minister and UMNO President, Datuk Seri Najib Razak could not find a single instance in my 51 years in politics to show that I am anti-Malay and anti-Islam.
Imagine! 51 years in politics is equivalent to 612 months, 2,652 week, 18,615 days and the very “productive” UMNO leaders and strategists could not unearth a single instance to prove that I am anti-Malay and anti-Islam and yet they continue with their lies and canard that I am anti-Malay and anti-Islam!
As a perfectionist, I hate to see the UMNO propaganda offensive against DAP being run in so sloppy and sub-standard a manner, failing to use all the ammunition that they could muster against the DAP – although they are lies and falsehoods.
For instance, since the launch of the UMNO propaganda offensive against DAP starting with the ferocious but groundless attack by the Johore Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohd Khaled Nordin against the DAP in the Johor State Assembly for more than a week, UMNO leaders and propagandists have yet to use one Big Lie against the DAP – that the DAP is funded and directed by Jews!
When will the UMNO leaders and strategists unleash this Jewish missile against the DAP in their vicious but baseless attacks on the DAP? Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysians worry Trump will drop a corruption investigation into his “favorite prime minister”
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Sunday, 4 December 2016
Joon Ian Wong
Quartz
December 01, 2016
Malaysia’s prime minister Najib Razak may have hundreds of thousands of his countrymen calling for his resignation — embroiled as he is in a multi-billion-dollar corruption case — but he has one thing to be grateful for: His onetime golfing partner is the next president of the United States, whose justice department happens to be pursuing that very same corruption case.
Najib has been talking up his close ties to Trump to the media. He recounted a victorious golf game played years ago at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey to the Star, a Malaysian daily. Najib had been in town for the United Nations General Assembly, and wanted to enjoy some R&R with his Malaysian delegation. Trump, hearing about the group, appeared and joined the game. So Najib and Trump partnered up.
At the game’s conclusion, Trump posed for a photo with Najib and the late Malaysian ambassador to the US, Jamaluddin Jarjis, and autographed it. It was inscribed: “To my favorite Prime Minister. Great win!” according to Najib. The Malaysian PM said he keeps the photo on his desk. “I did it before [Trump] became as famous as he is today,” Najib told the Star.
Najib is now reaping the rewards of that intuition. He says he had a “very warm and productive” phone call with his former golfing partner, and that ties between the two countries would be further strengthened.
Najib will hope that a friendly figure in the White House will help his chances in the biggest kleptocracy case brought by the US justice department to date. It’s seeking $1 billion in assets that it says are tied to “public corruption and a global money laundering conspiracy.” Read the rest of this entry »
Why is 1MDB scandal which made Malaysia a “global kleptocracy” allowed to be the “elephant in the room” throughout the five-day UMNO Assemblies, causing Najib and UMNO to lose all political credibility and moral authority as Malaysian Prime Minister and leading political party respectively?
Posted by Kit in Corruption, DAP, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak, UMNO on Saturday, 3 December 2016
Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s UMNO Presidential speech has been shocker. But the five-day UMNO General Assemblies are a greater shocker.
I fully agree with the head of the Pakatan Harapan Secretariat and former Deputy Higher Education Minister, Datuk Saifuddin Abdullah that Najib has made a grave error in using racial connotations at the UMNO General Assembly as it has disastrous racial implications.
Saifuddin is spot-on when he said firstly, that Najib had made baseless accusations against DAP as though DAP is anti-Malay and anti-Islam party; and secondly, Najib has compounded his error as DAP does not dictate matters in Pakatan Harapan, which is led collectively by the three component parties, DAP, PKR and Amanah.
The Pahang State Assembly Opposition Leader and DAP Pahang Assemblyman for Mentakab, Tengku Zulpuri Shah Raja Puji, has responded to Najib’s speech at the UMNO General Assembly declaring that he would have left DAP long ago if DAP had been anti-Malay or anti-Islam.
In actual fact, Tengku Zulpuri said Najib’s accusation was completely baseless as the DAP-led Penang State Government had brought many benefits to the Malays and promoted Islam in Penang State.
Tengku Zulpuri’s view has been endorsed by the former Penang Deputy Chief Minister and former Agriculture Deputy Minister, Datuk Seri Mohd Sharif Omar who said that the Penang Chief Minister, Lim Guan Eng “lebih banyak menjaga kebajikan rakyat Pulau Pinang, termasuk kaum Melayu di negeri itu berbanding pemimpin sebelum ini” and “tidak ada satu pun tindakan DAP yang menunjukkan parti tersebut anti-Melayu sepanjang Pakatan Harapan memimpin Pulau Pinang sejak tahun 2008”. Read the rest of this entry »
End the Corporate Shell Games
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Saturday, 3 December 2016
Leslie Caldwell
Bloomberg
NOV 30, 2016
Leaders from around the globe will converge Thursday in Panama City to discuss the next steps in the international fight against corruption.
That meeting will highlight for the world — and for our newly elected president and Congress — that the U.S. is in danger of falling behind our global partners in preventing the flow of illicit money through our financial markets. We have failed to enact legislation that would require the disclosure of the people behind legal entities — legislation that would assist law enforcement in stopping those who corrupt the U.S. and international financial systems.
It is no secret that the U.S. financial system is an attractive playground: We have the deepest, most liquid and most stable markets, and criminals seek to use the tools of our financial and banking systems to serve their illicit purposes. For an illegal enterprise to succeed, criminals must be able to hide, move and get access to their proceeds without detection. And when they are successful, their actions serve as a dual threat: Their criminal conduct itself can threaten the safety and security of all citizens, and their use of the financial and banking systems to hide their gains — or to fund additional criminal conduct — undermines the integrity of those systems.
One prominent example is a case the Justice Department filed seeking to forfeit and recover more than $1.2 billion in assets that were involved in, or traceable to, an international conspiracy to launder funds stolen from the people of Malaysia. The government of Malaysia wholly owns 1Malaysia Development Bhd., a strategic investment and development fund. As alleged in the complaint, over a six-year period, 1MDB associates took more than $3.5 billion from the development fund to purchase luxury condominiums, a $35 million jet, expensive works of art and a motion picture company that used the money to finance, among other things, the production of “The Wolf of Wall Street.” Read the rest of this entry »
Abu Dhabi SWF gets entangled in 1MDB scandal
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Saturday, 3 December 2016
By Bradley Hope and Nicolas Parasie
The Wall Street Journal
02 December 2016
When Barclays needed to raise capital in 2008, the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, known as IPIC, invested more than $5 billion in the UK bank. Through a subsidiary, IPIC acquired holdings in German auto maker Daimler and Swiss commodities powerhouse Glencore. It helped finance the ultraluxury New York skyscraper One57, nicknamed the Billionaire Building.
Driving IPIC was Khadem Al Qubaisi, a nightclub aficionado with slicked-back hair, a taste for the good life and close ties to princes who rule the emirate.
In June, Abu Dhabi’s crown prince abruptly ordered an end to the 32-year-old sovereign wealth fund’s existence as a standalone firm, saying it would be merged with another state entity.
Al Qubaisi? He now sits in an Abu Dhabi jail, fired and under investigation for money laundering, corruption and other possible offenses, according to people familiar with his situation.
Among the deals Al Qubaisi engineered at IPIC was one with 1Malaysia Development Bhd, or 1MDB, the embattled Malaysian state fund from which billions of dollars are missing, at least $800 million of which some investigators have said flowed into personal accounts of Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. Read the rest of this entry »
Singapore slaps penalties on StanChart, Coutts in 1MDB-related probe
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Saturday, 3 December 2016
by Anshuman Daga and Marius Zaharia | SINGAPORE
Reuters
Dec 2, 2016
Singapore’s central bank imposed penalties on the local units of U.K.-based Standard Chartered (STAN.L) and private bank Coutts for money laundering breaches related to Malaysia’s scandal-tainted 1MDB fund and said it was nearing the end of its probes.
The penalties – of S$5.2 million ($3.65 million) and S$2.4 million, respectively – were the latest punitive measures taken by the central bank in its crackdown on money laundering, having ordered the closure earlier this year of the local units of Swiss banks BSI and Falcon.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is also in the process of issuing a prohibition order against Tim Leissner, Goldman Sachs’ former Southeast Asia chairman.
“These actions send a strong signal that we will not tolerate the abuse of Singapore’s financial system for illicit purposes,” said Ravi Menon, the managing director of MAS.
“The supervisory investigations into the intricate web of international fund flows have been a learning experience for financial institutions as well as for MAS,” he said.
The inspection at Standard Chartered “revealed significant lapses in the bank’s customer due diligence measures and controls for ongoing monitoring,” MAS said. bit.ly/2h0ZMJQ
While the 28 breaches were “serious”, the central bank did not find “wilful misconduct.” Read the rest of this entry »
Singapore to Ban Former Goldman Banker in Connection With 1MDB Scandal
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Saturday, 3 December 2016
By TOM WRIGHT and JAKE MAXWELL WATTS
Wall Street Journal
Dec. 2, 2016
Executive allegedly wrote unauthorized reference letter for Malaysian U.S. authorities say is at the center of fraud at state investment fund
Singapore’s probe into a multibillion-dollar financial scandal touched Goldman Sachs Group Inc. for the first time on Friday as its central bank said it was planning to ban the Wall Street firm’s former top executive in Southeast Asia from operating in the city-state’s financial system for 10 years.
The executive, Tim Leissner, was Goldman’s point man on deals involving Malaysian state investment fund 1Malaysia Development Bhd., or 1MDB. The Monetary Authority of Singapore, the central bank, announced the proposed ban on Mr. Leissner after it found he had written a recommendation letter for a Malaysian financier, Jho Low, in June 2015. In it, Mr. Leissner claimed that Goldman had performed due diligence on Mr. Low.
“These statements were untrue and were made by Mr. Leissner without Goldman Sachs’ knowledge or consent,” the MAS statement said.
Goldman Sachs said in a statement Friday that it had discovered the matter in January 2016 and reported it to Singapore authorities. Mr. Leissner left Goldman in February after Goldman put him on leave. Read the rest of this entry »
Challenge to Najib to list out DAP’s Three Big Lies after I have exposed Najib’s three “Big Lies” in his UMNO presidential speech yesterday
Posted by Kit in Corruption, DAP, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak, UMNO on Friday, 2 December 2016
At the joint opening of the annual assemblies of UMNO’s Wanita, Youth and Puteri wings on Tuesday night, the Acting UMNO Deputy President, Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi sought to draw parallels between the Opposition’s propaganda efforts with the leaders of Nazi Germany.
He recounted how Adolf Hitler and his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels had a grip on German citizens through carefully crafted propaganda strategies.
Zahid said: “It was based on lies… Hitler once wrote: ‘If you are going to tell a lie, tell a big one and if you tell it often enough, people will begin to believe it’.
“Through creative radio and film propaganda, they succeeded in controlling the minds of more than 80 million people.”
Anyone doing a Wikipedia search will find the following explanation:
“A big lie is a propaganda technique. The expression was coined by Adolf Hitler, when he dictated his 1925 book Mein Kampf, about the use of a lie so ‘colossal’ that no one would believe that someone ‘could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.’ Hitler asserted the technique was used by Jews to unfairly blame Germany’s loss in World War I on German Army officer Erich Ludendorff.”
Hitler’s Propaganda Minister, Joseph Goebbels perfected Hitler’s “Big Lie” theory: “Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it” to the extent that he created the Fuhrer myth and the image of Hitler as the Messiah-redeemer.
Are we seeing a repetition of the “Big Lie” theory in modern-day Malaysia, with the UMNO leadership warning about the “Big Lie” theory but with the UMNO President, Datuk Seri Najib Razak becoming the biggest exponent of the “Big Lie” propaganda? Read the rest of this entry »
Will IGP Khalid say that he does not rule out arrest of Najib for receiving foreign funding, like Maria Chin?
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Thursday, 1 December 2016
The Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar has said that he has not ruled out the possibility of Bersih chairperson Maria Chin Abdullah being re-arrested.
The thought that immediately struck me was whether Khalid would ever say that he does not rule out the possibility of arresting Datuk Seri Najib Razak for receiving foreign funding, as being alleged against Maria Chin.
The answer is of course a clear-cut and categorical “No”
Can Khalid answer why he would never make such a statement about Najib when he had no problem making it against Maria Chin?
Especially when Najib had himself claimed that the RM2.6 billion deposited into his personal banking accounts were from foreign sources?
Read the rest of this entry »
If Maria Chin is to be held under Sosma for 28 days because of a puny grant from OSF before 2011, then Najib should be detained for life for receiving RM4.2 billion from foreign sources
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Elections, Gerakan, Najib Razak on Monday, 28 November 2016
Gerakan President Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong’s had been Minister for nearly two-and-a-half years after he defeated DAP candidate Dyana Sofya in the Teluk Intan by-election on May 31, 2016 with a wafer-thin majority of 238 votes.
Mah’s 30 months in Parliament and Cabinet are marked by three political and economic disasters: firstly, the government’s increasingly repressive measures highlighted by the undemocratic detention of Bersih chairperson, Maria Chin; secondly, Malaysia’s ignominy and infamy for being regarded worldwide as a “global kleptocracy”; and thirdly, the unchecked decline in the value of the Malaysian ringgit, reflecting widespread loss of investor confidence in the Malaysian economy and the country’s political leadership.
Gerakan claims to be the “conscience of BN government” but if Gerakan is able to play this role, these three national blackmarks would not have taken place.
The Gerakan is not the “conscience” of the BN government, for Mah’s 30 months as a Cabinet Minister is distinguished by Gerakan subservice to and compliance with UMNO’s repressive and kleptocratic policies, as Mah had not dared to say a single word whether about Maria Chin’s detention or the multi-billion dollar 1MDB global kleptocratic money-laundering scandal, which catapulted Malaysia into the stratosphere of a “global kleptocracy”.
When will Mah and Gerakan speak up to demand the immediate and unconditional release of Maria Chin, and to condemn her detention under Sosma, which is a clear-cut violation of parliamentary undertaking by the UMNO/BN government that the Sosma legislation would only be used against terrorists and not peaceful NGO activists and political opponents? Read the rest of this entry »
The battle lines in the 14GE is “democracy vs kleptocracy” and the political challenge is to create an united opposition coalition committed to constitutional and democratic reforms in Malaysia
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Election, Najib Razak, Sabah, Sarawak on Saturday, 26 November 2016
Former PAS leader and Kelantan State Assemblyman for Salor Datuk Husam Musa has predicted that the 14th general elections is likely to be held in March or April, as he expects PAS President Datuk Seri Hadi Awang’s private members’ motion to amend the Syariah Courts (Criminal Juriseiction) Act 1965 or Act 355 to be debated only after the 14th general election.
Husam sees the move by Hadi to table and defer his private member’s bill motion for a second time on the last day of the 25-sitting budget meeting on Thursday as a ruse and “effective gambit” to create a “win-win” situation for both PAS and UMNO – where PAS can show that its “355” gambit was not a failure, and where UMNO can “milk” political capital from the issue not only in next week’s UMNO General Assembly but also in the 14GE.
Husam may be right, but there is another possible scenario – with Parliament meeting in March, but no debate on Hadi’s private member’s motion.
Instead, the UMNO/BN government will take over Hadi’s private member’s bill, which had not even reached the “first reading” stage in Parliament, and present it to Parliament as a government bill for first reading. An all-party Parliamentary Select Committee will then be formed in the March meeting of Parliament to study the UMNO/BN government’s “takeover” of Hadi’s private member’s bill for a report to be submitted to Parliament, whether in the July/August or October/November meetings of Parliament. Read the rest of this entry »
Ex-BSI banker trial: Yeo Jiawei amassed S$23.9m in just 15 months after leaving BSI, say prosecutors
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals on Thursday, 24 November 2016
Grace Leong
Strait Times
NOV 22, 2016
Among Yeo’s assets were three Singapore properties worth a combined S$6.15 million and two properties in Australia worth S$6.3 million.
SINGAPORE – Former BSI banker Yeo Jiawei’s net worth escalated from S$2 million to nearly S$26 million in just 15 months after he left the Swiss private bank in Singapore, the court heard on Tuesday (Nov 22).
This wealth includes funds earned through “illicit means” and the “taking of secret profits” in transactions linked to Malaysian state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), said prosecutors .
Among Yeo’s assets were three Singapore properties worth a combined S$6.15 million and two properties in Australia worth A$6 million (S$6.3 million), prosecutors said on day 12 of his trial on four charges of obstructing justice by tampering with witnesses.
“I put it to you that it is quite unbelievable to amass so much – S$23.9 million- in just one year and three months, by just acting as an ‘introducer, intermediary, independent consultant or relationship manager’,” Deputy Public Prosecutor Tan Kiat Pheng said in his cross examination of Yeo.
But Yeo, 33, disagreed. “This can be proven by facts,” he argued. “CAD forgot these are referral fees earned from one of the biggest sovereign wealth funds in the world.” Read the rest of this entry »
Call on all MPs, including from BN, to reject five-year extension of Sosma police powers to detain a person for 28 days for investigation with the pernicious abuse of powers in Maria Chin’s detention, which is vengeful, vicious, vindictive
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Najib Razak on Wednesday, 23 November 2016
It is no wonder that the Malaysian education system and standards are so atrocious when Puad Zarkashi, who was the Deputy Education Minister when the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act was passed in Parliament in April 2012, can now talk such rubbish that Bersih chairperson Maria Chin’s “misdeeds” fit Sosma perfectly.
Puad, who is UMNO supreme council member, cannot be so dumb as not to know that the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz, who piloted the Sosma legislation through Parliament in April 2012, made a categorical assurance in Parliament which binds all Cabinet Ministers and Barisan Nasional leaders that Sosma legislation was meant to deal exclusively with the threat of terrorism and not meant for legitimate democratic activities like Bersih rallies, the first of which was held on 10th November 2007, Bersih 2 rally held on 9th July 2011, and the Bersih 3 rally held some ten days after Sosma was passed by Parliament on 28th April 2012.
I believe that if Nazri as the Minister responsible for the Sosma legislation had been asked pointedly in Parliament at the time in 2012 whether Bersih leaders, at that time led by Datuk Ambiga Sreenivasam, were likely to be targets and victims of Sosma detention, the answer will be a clear and categorical “No”, as even Barisan Nasional Ministers and MPs would know that the Bersih coalition of NGOs was neither a violent nor terrorist organization but committed to a peaceful, non-violent and democratic campaign to raise national consciousness for clean, free and fair elections. Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia’s 1MDB scandal – Nothing to see here
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Wednesday, 23 November 2016
Economist
Nov 19th 2016
Billions are stolen; only a whistle-blower goes to jail
IT IS more than two years since Malaysians began asking awkward questions about 1MDB, a state-owned investment firm from which billions of dollars are missing. But Malaysia has yet to prosecute anyone in connection with the scandal, perhaps the gravest in its history. Instead, on November 14th a local court handed a prison sentence to Rafizi Ramli, an outspoken opposition politician who has done much to educate the public about the affair. If Mr Rafizi’s appeal is rejected he will spend 18 months in jail.
Mr Rafizi’s offence was to leak details from a report into 1MDB’s dealings which had been produced by Malaysia’s auditor-general, but which the government had declared classified. Mr Rafizi had publicised a brief passage from the report to support speculation that the state firm’s massive losses could have delayed certain payments to Malaysian veterans (the organisations involved reject this claim). The government had initially promised that the auditor-general’s report would be released to the public in full, as is the convention. Now it is using the Official Secrets Act to silence those who refer to it.
Mr Rafizi’s conviction may prevent him from defending his parliamentary seat at the next general election. It adds to a string of legal battles hampering the opposition, which is readying for polls that may be called next year. Anwar Ibrahim, the opposition leader, has been imprisoned since 2015 on flimsy sodomy charges. A corruption case is presently being pressed against Lim Guan Eng, the chief minister of Penang (an opposition stronghold). Read the rest of this entry »
Who Is the Woman at the Heart of Malaysia’s Anti-Corruption Protests?
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Wednesday, 23 November 2016
Yenni Kwok
TIME
23rd Nov. 2016
On Wednesday morning, hundreds of women in yellow T-shirts marched to the parliamentary building in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, demanding the release of activist Maria Chin Abdullah, who was arrested last Friday. They carried banners and placards that said: “Women 4 Maria” and “Free Maria.”
The march marks the fifth day since Chin, chairperson of Bersih 2.0, a pro-democracy and anticorruption coalition group, was arrested last Friday, on the eve of a massive Bersih protest in the Malaysian capital.
Along with Chin, Malaysian authorities also nabbed her Bersih colleague Mandeep Karpal Singh and at least 12 other activists. All have been released, except Chin, the only one detained under the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act, or SOSMA, an antiterrorism law that allows detention for up to 28 days without trial. The 60-year-old activist — who suffers from hypertension, high blood pressure and osteoarthritis — is reportedly being held in solitary confinement in a cell without windows and with lights kept on around the clock.
“This amounts to torture,” says a statement from the Joint Action Group for Gender Equality, which organized the women’s march Wednesday.
Rights activists say Chin’s detention is unprecedented. “It’s the first time that a woman human-rights defender has been detained under SOSMA,” Lee Wei San, program coordinator at the All Women’s Action Society (AWAM), tells TIME. Read the rest of this entry »
Anti-graft crusader Clare Rewcastle-Brown draws Malaysia arrest threats
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Monday, 21 November 2016
SIMONE FOX KOOB
The Australian
November 21, 2016
Until late last week, British journalist Clare Rewcastle-Brown was looking forward to visiting Singapore and Sydney to march with thousands of people protesting over the Malaysian government’s 1MDB corruption scandal that she has been probing for years.
That was before an alarming discussion with her lawyers swiftly ended the trip.
Rewcastle-Brown was warned last week in no uncertain terms: the threat of arrest was far too high, due in part to the latest attempt by the Malaysian government to silence the investigative journalist.
“The threat of arrest has become quite real,” the veteran journalist told The Australian from her home in London.
“The case about 1MDB and (Singapore’s) BSI bank has been a major case in Singapore. So they have special extradition arrangements with Malaysia, and I was told that Malaysia had been putting enormous pressure to try one way or another to get their hands on me. The lawyers told me it just wasn’t worth the risk,” she said. Read the rest of this entry »
Call for immediate release of Bersih leaders Maria Chin, Hishamuddin Rais, four Pakatan Harapan MPs/SA Anthony Loke, Zuraida, Tian Chua and Howard Lee and others arrested in government’s Bersih 5 crackdown
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, nation building on Monday, 21 November 2016
Deepavali is the victory of light over darkness, good over evil and hope over despair.
Because of man’s imperfections and weaknesses, this will be an eternal struggle.
The successful Bersih 5 rally in Kuala Lumpur yesterday, where Malaysians regardless of race, religion, region, gender, age or politics came out as one people for democracy symbolized the victory of light over darkness, good over evil and hope over despair – which was all the more remarkable as it was achieved against the backdrop of great odds and obstacles caused by a six-week high-powered UMNO-sponsored Red Shirt campaign of racial provocations, threats, hatred and unashamed cyber-bullying to frustrate and thwart the Bersih 5 rally.
The Bersih 5 rally was a clarion declaration by Malaysians for Malaysia to become a democracy and not a kleptocrary.
It was history-making as it was the first gathering of Malaysians since the US Department of Justice (DOJ) kleptocratic action in July against multi-billion dollar 1MDB embezzlement and money-laundering to defend the honour and good name of Malaysia in national and international society from the infamy and ignominy of being regarded world-wide as a “global kleptocracy”!
But the darkness has not been completed dispelled in Malaysia, even gaining ascendance in some new areas – as witnessed by the government’s undemocratic Bersih 5 crackdown with the indiscriminate arrest of Bersih 5 activists, Pakatan Harapan elected representatives and NGO activists. Read the rest of this entry »
Najib is the real loser in the successful Bersih 5 rally yesterday
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak, Police on Sunday, 20 November 2016
There are those who say that that the greatest loser in the Bersih 5 rally yesterday were the Red Shirts, whose leader pledged a turn-out of over 300,000 people but could muster a turnout of only one per cent of some 3,000 to 4,000 people.
An inquiry should be conducted whether tens of millions of ringgit had been committed for a turn-out of 300,000 Red Shirts in Kuala Lumpur at Bersih 5 rally yesterday, and what happened to the mega sum of monies after such a dismal turnout of Red Shirts people, who clearly were quite ashamed of their actions which caused them to hide their faces.
But the real loser in yesterday’s successful Bersih 5 rally are not the Red Shirts, but the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak himself, without whom there would not be the Red Shirt phenomenon in the first place.
It is most remarkable that after a successful Bersih 5 rally, by whatever reckoning, the Prime Minister, far away in Lima, Peru, could say that Malaysians have become fed up with the Bersih electoral reform group or feel that its rallies do not bring any benefit to the country.
This is a classic case of a person able to see the speck in another’s eye but unable to notice the beam in his own eye. Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysians Rally at Anti-Najib Protest as He Vows to Stay On
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Sunday, 20 November 2016
Pooi Koon Chong and En Han Choong
Bloomberg
November 19, 2016
More ethnic Malays at 2016’s rally, Chinese still dominate
Thousands of Malaysians gathered in the country’s capital demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Najib Razak as his critics sought to maintain pressure on the premier over a funding scandal.
Protesters in yellow shirts marched through downtown Kuala Lumpur amid heavy police presence as pro-government supporters threatened to disrupt the activities. Police said both sides didn’t have permissions to gather and closed roads ahead of the fourth major rally by the Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections, or Bersih, since Najib came to power in 2009.
Bersih estimated 50,000 people attended the rally, including former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad who has been a leading critic of Najib in the past year. The police, which deployed 7,000 officers to maintain public order and prevent clashes, didn’t immediately provide a figure on the crowd size. Bersih’s protest in 2015 drew an estimated 300,000 people. Read the rest of this entry »
Tens of Thousands of Protesters Call for Najib Razak, Malaysian Leader, to Resign
Posted by Kit in Bersih, Corruption, Financial Scandals, Najib Razak on Sunday, 20 November 2016
By RICHARD C. PADDOCK
New York Times
NOV. 19, 2016
Malaysians Demand Resignation of Premier
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, on Saturday to call for the resignation of Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is accused of taking $1 billion from a government investment fund.
The protesters, wearing the yellow T-shirts of Malaysia’s clean government movement, known as Bersih, converged on the city center to hear their leaders call for Mr. Najib’s ouster. Among the speakers was former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, 91, who once chose Mr. Najib as prime minister but now criticizes his former protégé’s government as corrupt.
The authorities had tried to thwart the daylong, peaceful demonstration by arresting at least eight protest leaders on Friday, including Bersih’s chairwoman, Maria Chin Abdullah. She was being held under the country’s strict Security Offenses Act.
Human rights advocates criticized the arrests, which they said were aimed at suppressing turnout for the rally. Read the rest of this entry »
-
You are currently browsing the archives for the Corruption category.
