Sacked Selangor exco member Hasan Ali has claimed that two former colleagues - Dr Xavier Jeyakumar and Halimah Ali - had spent significantly more in renovating their offices compared to him.

NONE "The Selangor government should (compare) my costs with (that incurred) other government departments and companies around that time,”  he told a press conference at his home in Kuala Lumpur this afternoon.

"The information that I received is that my costs were far lower than that of Xavier and Halimah.”

Hasan was countering a claim by Bukit Antarabangsa state assemblyperson Azmin Ali that he had been wasteful in spending RM300,000 on renovations to his office.

However, Hasan insisted that the cost was reasonable, and that the quality and scope of work had been "moderate".

"The office is also for 19 other staff from the Microcredit Scheme, so it is not fair to compare this to the menteri besar's office which is only for one person," he said.

Hasan said the attack indirectly raises questions about the Selangor government's credibility.

azlan "Perhaps Azmin (right in photo) doubts the leadership of Selangor Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim (left in photo) and therefore, has chosen to attack a former Selangor exco," he said.

In light of this, he said Khalid should order an audit into the cost of renovations by government companies, departments and the exco, to gauge where his expenditure is ranked.

Yesterday, Khalid had said that there would be no action against Hasan as the renovations had been carried out in accordance with treasury procedures.

Hasan also denied two other allegations that have been levelled against him.

The first was on his alleged failure to implement the open tender system for Selangor Public Works Department (JKR) sub-contractors.

"For 2011 and 2012, Selangor JKR had called an open tender, as instructed by the state treasury, but the main contractor KPS-HCM had not received the names of sub-contractors to carry out routine road maintenance.

"Seeing that the work could not be delayed, KPS-HCM extended the contract of existing companies on a monthly basis," he said.

As for 2009 and 2010, he said the sub-contractors had been chosen based on performance through direct negotiations with KPS-HCM.

The recommended list was approved by the state treasury which gave the green light to the state JKR director to issue offer letters to some 85 sub-contractors, for work in nine districts.

‘Explanation already given’

The second complaint was about the ‘high cost’ of the Selangor Malay Customs and Heritage Corp (Padat) conference launch.

However, Hasan said the exact cost was RM546,920 which included other programmes approved by the state exco.

"Padat prepared a complete report on this and it was tabled in the state assembly and at meetings," he said.

Explaining that these issues had previously been explained in the state assembly, Hasan accused Azmin of having bad intentions in reviving them.

He speculated this might be an attempt to undermine Khalid.

"I would like to thank the menteri Besar for his statement which verified that Azmin’s accusations are baseless and that all my actions during my tenure as exco had complied with the required rules," he added.