COMMENT Former New Straits Times group editor-in-chief Kadir Jasin raised a good point for discussion that we should provide a ‘safe passage’ for embattled Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak in order for him to step down.

I agree with the veteran newsman that if the “present political and economic crises are not immediately solved, we could become like Greece or worse like Zimbabwe .”

But this is only part of the story. To be precise, there are no simple solutions to a complicated scandal involving the country’s chief, that is, if Najib is guilty, as some allege.

I, too, believe this is where we are heading to as a country, if Najib chooses to hang on to his office indefinitely. If we allow this to drag on, soon we may be staring at a ringgit that rings hollow.

Déjà vu

It has already happened before, during the Asian financial meltdown in 1998, and there is no reason to believe that it will not happen again (indeed, it has happened in isolated cases with certain foreign money changers) - that our ringgit is not accepted.

Therefore, to Kadir ( photo ), I would say that when things do get worse, it will only be even harder for the country to forgive the crime, unless restitution is made and every dime is returned.

Of course, this can only happen, they say, “within the context of a Barisan Nasional (BN) scenario”, where the severest of crimes can still be forgiven, but any small speck on the eyes of the opposition is seen as a big log. Yeah, Malaysia Boleh!

There is hardly any rationale behind the idea of using borrowed money for investment purposes unless the return yield is many times more than the bank loan interest.

To borrow money to invest has never been a good investment strategy in the first place. Investment guru Robert Kiyosaki, of ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ fame, has always advised his readers to settle all their loans first, before investing their money. You cannot go wrong with this simple maxim that Kiyosaki teaches.

Opportunity to come clean

Till today, Najib has not answered the questions asked whether 1MDB had indeed borrowed RM4 billion from the Retirement Fund Incorporated (KWAP).

At the same time, where has the total of RM42 billion of borrowed money gone? How is that a sum of RM2.6 billion and another RM40 million flowed into Najib’s personal accounts? These are the allegations that have kept cropping up which affect people’s perception towards the sixth prime minister of Malaysia.

Or, at least this is the perception most people (both local and international community) have of the country’s future, with the free-falling Malaysian ringgit, a drop in international reserve and exports that did get the boost despite a lower ringgit compared to crisis we faced 1997/8.

But then, Najib has never taken up the challenge to explain the true story to fellow Malaysians. When questions are raised by the opposition, as well as former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, the answers are never given.

Though one can appreciate the need now for face-saving, and this being an important value with the Malay culture, given that Najib has received the amount of RM2.6 billion into his personal accounts with no plausible explanation from the onset, the alleged crime against the country is greater than anyone can imagine.

I believe even Dr Mahathir finds it hard to believe himself that such a huge amount had flowed into an individual’s personal accounts, as the amount is beyond any ordinary man’s imagination. It is, in short, a whopping 2,600 million ringgit! Imagine just having RM1 million in your bank account!

The last scandal was the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ), involving more than RM12.5 billion of loans, according to PriceWaterHouseCoopers (PwC), but 1MDB has now surpassed a figure of several times more - RM42 billion!

Whether this has anything to do with corruption or otherwise, even fellow Umno member Sanusi Junid said that the Indonesians are “crying because they lost to us... but not in badminton” but that “Malaysia has finally become a world champion - in corruption .”

The critics - in fact, most Malaysians - refuse to believe that an Arab family had indeed dropped the donation into Najib’s account, because Malaysia has fought the Islamic State (IS). Those who had fought the IS should be the beneficiaries. Did they, in the first place, receive the money? The story lacks credibility.

We can recall that in 1985, there was also an attempt by 56 Philippine legislators to impeach then-president Ferdinand Marcos for alleged diversion of US aid (read, ‘donation’) for personal use. Later, it was exposed by San Jose Mercury News that the Marcoses’ had multimillion-dollar investment and property holdings in the United States.

It is for similar reasons like this that the Wall Street Journal ’s ( WSJ ) publisher Dow Jones & Company has confirmed that it responded last week to Najib Razak’s lawyer’s letter that it had told Najib’s legal team that it will continue to stand by the accuracy of its articles on the 1MDB scandal.

It could have been worse

We can all understand that the Malays have an idiom that when you chase a dog, never chase it to a corner where there is no escape. Hence, I believe this is the basis for Kadir’s ‘safe passage’ suggestion for Najib.

While it may be true that Ferdinand Marcos escaped imprisonment in the Philippines, but he and his wife, the flamboyant Imelda Marcos, were forced into exile.

Marcos was listed as the World’s Most Corrupt Leaders according to the 2004 Global Transparency Report, second only to Suharto, the former president of Indonesia. He had been involved in the cases of some 35,000 torture victims and 70,000 were incarcerated during his rule. A total of 3,257 extrajudicial killings had been attributed to Marcos himself.

It was the US which provided a safe passage for Marcos to leave the Philippines for Hawaii. It was a huge loss for the Philippines as the country had to make every effort to recover as much of the stolen assets from the country’s coffers.

Suharto of Indonesia, despite being forced to step down, was never incarcerated for his corruption. This does not necessarily mean that a safe passage or a special concession should be made for the people involved in the 1MDB scandal.

The outcome could be even worse. In fact, depending on the severity of the crime against humanity which will have to be met with punishment in this lifetime. Kadir has failed to mention names of dictators such as Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein ( photo ), Louis XVI and the like.

Hitler committed suicide by gunshot in 1945 while Saddam was executed by the hangman after being convicted of crimes against humanity. At the same time, Louis XVI was guillotined in 1793 and his wife Marie Antoinette, too, suffered a similar fate. There is no escape: ‘Reap what you sow’.

If a safe passage can be provided in order to save face, what about former opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim? He was imprisoned six years for abuse of power; and, another five years for sodomy against Saiful Bukhari Azlan that he had allegedly committed.

It is not easy to negotiate the terms or relax the punishment when a country’s chief, whether from BN or Pakatan, has been found guilty of stealing from the country’s coffers.

At best, if found guilty, Najib could only mitigate, if he resigned today, charged immediately for some criminal breach of trust, but at this juncture, it is all hypothetical.

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.

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