All cabinet decisions are made collectively. As such, any personal view on matters such as the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) fiasco is irrelevant, Umno minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said today.

"As cabinet members, we cannot criticise the cabinet because criticising it means we are criticising ourselves," Ismail told reporters at a press conference in Serdang today.

"Everything that involves 1MDB has been explained during cabinet meetings,” he said when asked about the latest remarks of Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin that are seen as critical of Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's handling of the 1MDB crisis.

"So, there is no reason why certain cabinet members can say that they still do not understand."

As question and answer sessions were made available during 1MDB briefings, Ismail, the agriculture and agro-based industry minister pointed out, anyone could ask the 1MDB representative for more explanations.

"If one decides not to take the opportunity to ask questions, one cannot, then, make statements saying that he or she still does not understand the matter," he said.

Personal view matters not when concensus is reached

Ismail admitted that not all decisions made by the cabinet are agreed upon by every individual minister.

"For example, several ministers may not agree on certain things involving the Agriculture Ministry.

"But once the meeting has ended and a consensus is reached, any personal view is no longer important because it is a collective decision," he said.

The minister said there was no point in conducting cabinet meetings, or even Umno supreme council meetings, if a member decides to say that he or she did not agree with the decision made during the meetings.

Muhyiddin, in his speech on Sunday, which has since been viral on the social media and YouTube as well, had said, among others, that nobody could truly explain the 1MDB issue, even in the cabinet.

He said even those who talked about 1MDB did not even understand what the problem faced by the debt-ridden company was and said Najib was the only person who could clarify the matter to the public.

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