Malacca's Alor Gajah Municipal Council (MPAG) has denied misusing public funds to organise a study tour to a municipal council in Australia, scheduled next Wednesday.

DAP leader Lim Guan Eng had criticised the municipal council for wasting public funds on what he described as a "vacation" to the Australian town of Newcastle - about 170km north of Sydney - tagging the trip at over RM100,000.

But MPAG president Idris Haron refuted Lim's allegations, saying that such trips were "regular official visits" to more advanced municipalities overseas for "better exposure to the modern management practices of other local and district councils.

"Such exposure is important to improve our services, especially after our recent upgrade from a district council to a municipal council on May 1," he said when contacted.

The Alor Gajah delegation of 25 councillors is expected to visit the City Council of Newcastle, meet the mayor and attend a meeting to share experiences with their Australian counterparts.

"Such study tours are organised every two years. For this one (Australia), we got the approval from the council in August and from the state's exco last month."

Idris said the municipal council only need to get the consent, not permission, from the state government and the Housing and Local Government Ministry - the two authorities which monitor its activities.

Anonymous call

Lim said an anonymous caller, who claimed to be calling from a payphone in Kuala Lumpur, tipped him off last night on the Australian "vacation".

"The caller was very angry that the council was misusing public funds."

On Lim's claim of a ministerial directive for overseas study tours to be limited to Southeast Asian countries to save money, Idris said he was not aware of any such circular.

"I have yet to come across such a circular but I've already asked my staff to verify the claim."

He reiterated that the benefits from the visit would be manifold, especially the "mental development" of the Alor Gajah councillors.

"We are spending this money after going through the required procedures," he insisted.

On Lim's claim that the district council had not learnt its lesson from a similar previous experience involving a trip to Europe, Idris said there has never been any such trip.

"I think he, as an opposition member, has not done his homework. As far as I know, having been in this position for three years, the council has never approved a tour to Europe."

Lim argued that this controversy only reiterated the importance of democracy in local government to ensure that those elected by the people are accountable and transparent.

"(But) since local councillors are not elected, they feel that they do not need to be accountable on how public money is spent.

"A failure to respect democracy will only encourage the abuse of power," he added.

He also urged Malacca Chief Minister Ali Rustam to cancel the Australia trip at tomorrow's state exco meeting.