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Kit Siang wants emergency sitting on PAC's 1MDB report
Published:  Apr 9, 2016 4:32 PM
Updated: 1:47 PM

DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang has urged the Dewan Rakyat to debate the Public Account Committee's (PAC) report on debt-ridden sovereign fund 1MDB as it is a grave scandal undermining Malaysia's reputation overseas.

"For this reason, I urge a four-day emergency Parliament sitting on the PAC report on 1MDB at the end of April or early May... before the next scheduled meeting of Parliament on May 16," he said during a ceramah in Bagan, Penang today.

The veteran politician said that progressive parliaments in other countries would have had full and wide-ranging debate on the long-awaited PAC report on the 1MDB scandal.

Especially since it has become a global scandal that has made the country infamous as one of world’s top ten list of most corrupt countries.

"But the Malaysian Parliament just adjourned on Thursday without any debate on the PAC report whatsoever. This is a gross irresponsibility on the part of Parliament," he lamented.

Lim also complained that MPs were not allowed to take out the PAC report on the 1MDB, although it was put on their tables.

"This is the first time in Malaysian parliamentary history that documents tabled on MPs table were physically barred from being taken out of the chambers, although subject to an embargo.

Previously, MPs were never prevented from taking out government papers and reports including budget papers and treasury reports put on their tables but which were embargoed until a particular date and time," he said.

Lim claimed that this shows the nervousness of the powers-that-be about the PAC report on the 1MDB which he alleged is being spun by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's supporter to exonerate him from culpability in the firm where he chaired the advisory board.

"They cannot be more wrong, and if Umno/BN strategists and propagandists think they could influence national and international opinion in this direction, they cannot be more naive and wrong," said Lim.

He concluded that the PAC report on 1MDB is but the “tip of the iceberg” and all efforts at democratic, accountable and good governance must be directed at exposing and unveiling the “iceberg” that remains tantalisingly hidden from view.

The PAC report on 1MDB was tabled in Dewan Rakyat on Thursday which had fingered the fund's former CEO of Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi and the management team as being responsible for the troubled firm's woes.

This had roused a firestorm in reaction from both sides of the political divide with Najib's supporters claiming it cleared the PM while critics noted that the report while did not mention the premier's name directly, its findings showcased that the Pekan MP gave the go-ahead on all of 1MDB's decisions including its problematic investments and loans.

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