Works Minister and MIC President S Samy Vellu today said the Anti-Corruption Agency (ACA) had cleared him of all corruption allegations and there was no reason for him to be sacked from the cabinet.

"As for as I know, Dr Mahathir (Mohamad) knew about the three-month investigations by ACA which was a result of several reports made by some people," he told a press conference at the MIC annual general assembly in Kuala Lumpur.

"I was cleared of whatever allegations made against me and there was no reason to sack me from the cabinet as a result of those allegations.

"If these allegations were proven in court, I would have stepped down voluntarily," he added.

Samy Vellu was responding to remarks made by the former premier during an interview with malaysiakini recently.

Mahathir said he was powerless to sack ministers who were alleged of corruption.

Telekom shares

The former premier said Barisan Nasional would have suffered an internal backlash if he had sacked Samy Vellu.

"You ask MIC what they would do if I removed Samy Vellu. MIC is scared stiff of Samy Vellu.

"When it comes to the head of a component party, I don't have that much liberty to pick who the head should be or to remove the head from being in the cabinet," added Mahathir, who led the ruling coalition for 22 years.

Samy Vellu, one of the country's longest serving ministers, has been besieged by allegations pertaining to the RM120 million Telekom shares given for the upliftment of the Indian community in 1990.

It had been alleged that the nine million Telekom shares were not properly channeled to the community but were diverted to three little known companies.

'That's his business'

Meanwhile, Samy Vellu said it was unhealthy to simply label someone as corrupt.

"You just can't say the minister is corrupt, the government is corrupt. All this talk are not good for the government," he added.

He said that Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi also knew about the ACA investigation and that he had been cleared.

"After three months of investigations, ACA said I did nothing wrong," he stressed.

Asked if he was upset with Mahathir for making such remarks now, Samy Vellu said: "I don't want to say anything about Tun (Mahathir)".

"He can do what he likes. That's his business," he said.

"He said many people in the world are saying Malaysia is corrupt. That is not true, there must be a limit to this kind of criticism," he added.