Friday 29 Mar 2024
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(Sept 10): Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's actions in disrupting the investigations into the RM2.6 billion donation he had received shows that the money was obtained illegally, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said.

The former prime minister, who is now one of Najib's fiercest critics, said this was among the reasons why the majority of the people rejected him as prime minister and "hated" him.

"Najib's actions in stopping the investigations into the RM2.6 billion that was in his personal account proves that the money was obtained illegally. If it was obtained in a halal manner, Najib would not fear the probe," Dr Mahathir wrote in his blog, chedet.cc, today.

"The majority of the people reject and hate Najib as the prime minister. They cannot accept Najib's claims that the RM2.6 billion that was transferred into his account was donated by Arab people."

The former prime minister, who has repeatedly asked for Najib's resignation, said that the current administration has caused the value of the ringgit to fall so much that the prices of goods have increased, inflation has gone up and stocks have gone down.

"Many are going bankrupt. Their burdens have increased with the GST (goods and services tax) that has caused the price of goods and services to go up as well," he said.

On top of that, Dr Mahathir said, many have children who are studying overseas and have had to increase the amount of money they spend with the decline in the value of the ringgit, noting that the ringgit was now almost RM7 to the pound sterling compared with RM4 to a pound before.

"The country's development has been neglected and RM42 billion was borrowed, unwisely invested and billions cannot be traced.

"What we know is Najib has RM2.6 billion in his account. And now the money has been transferred out but we don't know where. And when investigations were started by responsible government bodies, Najib dissolved these bodies," he added.

Dr Mahathir was referring to the crippling of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), and the special task force which consisted of the Attorney-General's Chambers, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Bank Negara Malaysia and Special Branch who were investigating both the 1MDB fiasco and the RM2.6 billion in Najib's accounts.

Najib recently said he had been cleared by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) over the RM2.6 billion in his personal accounts, which he said was on behalf of Umno, and not for his personal gain.

Allegations of RM2.6 billion in Najib's accounts first surfaced in a report by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on July 2, citing documents from Malaysian investigators.

The WSJ said the source of the funds was unknown, but they had flowed through 1MDB-linked entities in various tranches, the largest of which – US$681 million – was channelled into Najib's accounts in March 2013, ahead of the general election in May that year.

MACC had said that the US$700 million which had been funnelled into Najib’s accounts was a donation and not money from 1MDB.

Putrajaya had later said the RM2.6 billion was from a Middle Eastern donor whose identity has not been revealed. – The Malaysian Insider

 

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