YOURSAY | ‘Malaysia is well on the road to perpetual mediocrity.’
FBI: Najib received US$756 million from stolen 1MDB funds
TheWakandan: The sheer enormous scale of this conspiracy - billions stolen in the name of the Finance Ministry to finance an election war chest in 2013.
To many people, it was obviously ordered by the then finance and prime minister Najib Abdul Razak and executed by Low Taek Jho, better known as Jho Low.
Now, Najib is on trial for this, whose defence was that he did not know what was going on. His hotshot lawyer thinks that this is the only viable defence considering so much has been revealed as evidence.
The defence expected the judge to buy this. How could he if even the ordinary folks can see clearly that that was one big national heist?
And he rightly called Najib a “national embarrassment” because we seemed to set records for the wrong reasons - the biggest kleptocrat heist of all time and losing a jumbo jet without a trace.
The biggest crime other than the alleged thieving itself is the flagrant violation of democracy, where illegal money was being used to win the election.
Now, those who are wondering why the people could accept this - that they were the same people who won the election because of these monies. How could they not want what they had gained?
OrangeKoala1303: The sickening part is that the vast number of Malaysians don’t seem to mind. As long as they get free oil change, free TV, RM200, BR1M, etc, they're happy to collect the scraps that fall off the thieves' table.
Malaysia is well on the road to perpetual mediocrity. Corruption and lies are just how things are done here. I am not pessimistic. Just realistic.
Businessfirst: We deserve the government we vote for.
Those who prioritise short-term gain for a few days of celebration with food and beer (in Sarawak and Sabah) and some RM200 every five years during election time, and vote for GPS, GRS, BN, etc, will not prosper.
They will remain stuck where they are, begging for scraps, struggling to get minimum wage or employment, be exploited, etc.
Meanwhile, in Norway, which discovered oil about the same time as Malaysia, each citizen there is born an instant millionaire (through a massive fund in which the surplus wealth produced by Norwegian petroleum income is deposited).
One country goes backwards to a failed state and another goes forward to prepare its citizens for the digital age.
IndigoJaguar7545: See, a competent opposition would have taken revelations like this and educated the people on:
why we need to clean up the public service
why we need whistleblower protection in schools, hospitals, media
why we need an ombudsman to independently prosecute any civil servant or politician
why we need to increase the minimum wage and to hell with crony capitalists that will never have enough
why we need to dismantle PM position significantly and seek an independent MACC, police
why small business support is nothing because only “big-time international friends with jobs for my kids” get massive funds
But no, we don’t get any of these. Instead, we get excuses.
FairMind: Najib is said to receive US$756 million (RM3.18 billion) and Jho Low, US$1.42 billion (RM5.97 billion) of 1MDB funds.
We have heard that Low splurged his money on entertainment, gifts, gambling, purchasing a yacht, properties and assets. Some of it was either confiscated or frozen. Some of it was returned to Malaysia.
The question nobody has asked so far - where is the money kept by Najib? Why is he still allowed to keep these insane amounts of money?
BlueFish0451: So Jho Low allegedly stole US$1.42 billion. Was he holding it on behalf of his Bossku?
Najib returned US$620 million to accounts controlled by Low. Isn't it obvious that Najib was faking the return so the money could be kept by Low on his behalf?
Anyway, Malaysians deserve to be swindled. The more the better because the louder they will scream for “Bossku”.
Koel: There seems to be a discrepancy between the FBI’s figures for what Najib allegedly took in comparison with the figures released by our “investigators”.
And Low took twice as much. And foreigners helped themselves to the pickings too. Malaysians better take a good hard look at these figures.
These figures all show why taxpayers are further taxed. This is why public education and healthcare have no money to improve. This is why food prices go up. This is why energy costs go up.
Basically, the government has no money. And this is because it looks like the ex-PM put his grubby hand out to help himself and then allowed a bunch of foreigners to also steal money belonging to hardworking Malaysians.
This is what Johorean voters have now enabled. Good luck to these people. Hold on to your money when the next 1MDB starts. Your children will thank you.
GreyDove8171: The rakyat who voted for BN in hopes of “peace and prosperity” are just lying to themselves. I would have more empathy for them if the 1MDB issues were never raised - because then we can say that Malaysians are truly deceived.
But with so much evidence, witnesses and the money trail, the fact that there are still so many Malaysians who adore Bossku shows that we are already a failed nation full of ignorant and selfish idiots who are disillusioned by their own choice.
Billy the Goat: This piece of news must be forwarded to all the voters who picked “Bossku” in the recent state elections and to quite a number of my fellow Chinese Malaysians who invariably claimed he had done a lot for the people when helming the government of this country.
How irrational and foolish can some Malaysians be!
