KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 12): The Minister of Economic Affairs, Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali has dismissed claims that the newly-minted economic action council was created because the Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad was unhappy with the current Cabinet's performance.

"It's not true.

"In Pakatan Harapan, decisions are made collectively. The council comprises different people with different sets of expertise, all their inputs are important and we will use them to decide on the right course of action," he told reporters on the sidelines of an event earlier.

Tun Dr Mahathir announced yesterday the formation of the council which will be headed by himself and include other ministers such as Mohamed Azmin, as well as several business leaders.

Mohamed Azmin said the new council, which will be action-oriented, will work on addressing issues such as the wellbeing of the people, the problem of rising cost of living.

"We already have a long term economic policy. We just need to work on the implementation," he said.

Mohamed Azmin was also responding to assertions made by the Prime Minister's special advisor Datuk Kadir Jasin, who in his blog today said the council's creation could allude to the current Cabinet not being able to handle issues related to economy, finance and welfare of the people.