Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng today expressed doubt if Putrajaya will honour the memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed with the Selangor government over water concessions in the state, drawing from his own experience in Penang.

Lim said the federal government had recently refused to approve water transfer to Penang from Sungai Perak despite inking an agreement to do so with Penang in 2011.

This transfer, he added, could secure water supply in Penang beyond 2026.

            

"The question is, can we believe them?" asked Lim, who did not want to comment on the details of the agreement between Selangor and Putrajaya as he was not privy to it.

"I hope they (federal government) would honour the agreement and not renege on it," he said when met at the sidelines after attending an interview with KiniTV at the latter's office in Kuala Lumpur today.

The MOU inked by Energy, Water and Green Technology Minister Maximus Ongkili and Selangor Menteri Besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim yesterday afternoon allows Selangor to take over the water concessionaires  there.

In return, the state would allow the federal government to go ahead with the construction of the Langat 2 water treatment plant.

Lim also said pro-Pakatan Rakyat Facebook pages which became   inaccessible in Malaysia over the weekend should be given "room to reply" before any action is taken against the pages.

"There is freedom of expression in the country. Of course, that is not freedom to lie. But if they did something wrong, they should be given space to reply," he said.

He  added that that while Pakatan could set up their own web pages if their supporters' Facebook pages are made inaccessible, he still wants the page administrators to "engage" with Facebook over the matter.

"I think there should be more engagement with Facebook ," he said, referring to suggestions that the pages were made inaccessible due to third-party complaints regarding the contents on the pages.

The Communications and Multimedia Ministry had claimed it did not know who ordered the blocking of the pages.

However, Lim refuted allegations that the pages were all part of DAP's so-called "Red Bean Army", a band of cyber troopers.

"We don't have a bean army, nor do we have an army for the matter. It's all just the construct of some people's lazy imagination," he said.