I refer to the Malaysiakini report PAS wants royal hand to tear up Apco contract .

The following statement appearing in various dailies and Internet news portals recently is referred to:

‘In our work as communications consultants we are not involved in policy formation but in the presentation of information the government intends to share with the public.

‘We work for governments which are prepared to take our counsel on transparency, democracy and the rule of law. We are honoured to continue our work with the government of Malaysia.’

The policies and schemes of the ruling party have always been very well-fed to the Malaysian people through a legion of minions, ie, the newspapers and TV stations that it controls.

There is absolutely no necessity for a foreign corporation to sit in the consultant’s high chair and ‘direct’ how, and with what stuffing and dressing, local political ‘communications’ are ‘presented’ to the Malaysian public.

There is hardly any elbow room for foreign consultancy in the mere regurgitation of simple propaganda. Surely, the Malaysian people do not wish to pay to hear what they have already heard before, albeit in a new and artful tune.

As for the lofty avowance on foreign honour and Malaysian transparency, democracy and rule of law, it would appear, amply and facetiously, that the outflow of Malaysian taxpayers’ money for the consultancy has not yielded a correspondingly honourable inflow of transparency, democracy and rule of law into the sclerosed veins of the ruling regime.

The ruling party has yet to ‘take counsel’ and glean one grain of the democratic seeds supposedly sowed by the foreign consultant. What a farce, and at what price?