Umno veteran Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah has rejected a call to blacklist companies that allegedly sponsored the Bersih movement.

"I don't think that is right," the Gua Musang MP told reporters when met after the launch of a book on a collection of essays, 'The End of UMNO? Essays on Malaysia’s Dominant Party', at the Royal Lake Club in Kuala Lumpur today.

"Anybody can donate to any cause, so long as it does not break any law or the constitution," Tengku Razaleigh said when asked for comment on the call first made by Awang Selamat, believed to be the joint pseudonym of Malay daily Utusan Malaysia's senior editors.

In its weekly column published yesterday, the daily said it is wrong to back a group that is ostensibly trying to depose a democratically elected government.

Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Abdul Rahman Dahlan later backed the proposal and said he would direct the Economic Planning Unit (EPU) and the Public-Private Partnership Unit (Ukas) to conduct background checks on companies that seek government contracts through the two agencies.

On whether civil servants who do not support the government of the day should resign, Tengku Razaleigh said be no such calls should be made.

'I am not defending Bersih'

"There is no such thing. They have the right to exercise their freedom. It's democracy.

"I am not defending Bersih or anybody, I just talk about the law," he said in response to the reported call by Special Affairs Department (Jasa) strategic communications director Tun Faisal Ismail Aziz.

Referring to the forthcoming Bersih 5 rally, Tengku Razaleigh said that he does not see anything wrong with the participation of civil servants in it, so long as the Nov 19 rally is not against the law.

Yesterday, Tun Faisal tweeted his call ti\o civil servants and appended an infographic detailing the incentives for them in the 2017 federal budget that was tabled last Friday.

Responding to criticisms later, Tun Faisal said his tweet never stated that civil servants must only vote for BN, but argued it would be difficult for them to be a dedicated civil servant and support the opposition.