How many Malaysians will agree with Gani that these three are the “big fishes” in the PKFZ scandal?

Guilty or otherwise, there can be no doubt that the trio are mere “cogs in the wheel” of the “mother of all scandals” and the authorities concerned have still to bring the “big fishes” to justice.

Gani said that investigations into the PKFZ scandal are ongoing and more people would be brought to book.

What Malaysians want to see are not just the prosecution of the “cogs in the wheel” but the masterminds of the PKFZ “mother of all scandals”.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PcW) investigations and the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) inquiries have laid building blocks for the full whole sordid tale of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal to be told to Malaysians, right from the beginning of the PKFZ land acquisition in the nineties, and for all those involved in the intricate and complex conspiracy to be revealed.

The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak should “walk the talk” of his commitment to combat corruption and abuses of power by establishing a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate and reveal all about the PKFZ “mother of all scandals” or he would have failed his first KPI test of placing “fighting corruption” as one of six priority sectors.

I argued that what is needed is a Royal Commission of Inquiry to conduct a comprehensive and no-holds-barred investigation into the “mother of all scandals” including relevant Ministerial and Cabinet aspects of the scandal instead of trying to sweep the whole issue back under the carpet.

I also posed the following question:

“In the first place, is Mohd Sidek the most appropriate person to head the super task force on the PKFZ scandal?

“Before Mohd Sidek takes up this appointment, he should explain to the Malaysian public why he had failed in the past two years to carry out the Cabinet decision in July 2007 when it resolved on the RM4.6 billion bailout of PKFZ, including giving retrospective approval to the four illegal Letters of Support unlawfully given by the two previous Transport Ministers, Tun Dr. Ling Liong Sik and Tan Sri Chan Kong Choy, that the Chief Secretary should conduct an inquiry as to how the four Letters of Support could have issued unlawfully and to take the necessary disciplinary actions against the culprits who have now landed the country with a RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal.

“Did Mohd Sidek carry out such an inquiry as not a single culprit had been identified, let alone penalised for the unlawful issue of the four Letters of Support in the past two years?

“Clearly, Mohd Sidek had not carried out the Cabinet instruction or there would not be today a merry-go-round of multiple investigations into the PKFZ scandal, but all without the necessary sweeping powers to get to the bottom of the scandal.

“Can Mohd Sidek succeed where he had failed in the past two years? I hope Parliament is given a specific answer to these questions in the ministerial replies.”

This is the reply that I have received from the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Nazri Aziz, by way of a written answer as he had promised Parliament during the winding-up of the debate on November 9, 2009 for issues he was unable to reply orally because of the constraints of time.

This is Nazri’s response to my budget speech on the PKFZ scandal:

1.

YB Ipoh Timur mencadangkan agar ditubuhkan suruhanjaya diraja untuk menyiasat skandal Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ). Untuk makluman Yang Berhormat, Kerajaan belum bercadang untuk menubuhkan suruhanjaya diraja kerana satu pasukan petugas khas telah ditubuhkan bagi mengemukakan cadangan untuk tindakan susulan Kerajaan berhubung laporan audit PKFZ tersebut.
2.

YB Ipoh Timur ingin tahu sama ada Y.Bhg. Ketua Setiausaha Negara telah melaksanakan keputusan Mesyuarat Jemaah Menteri pada Julai 2007 berkenaan 4 surat sokongan oleh Menteri Pengangkutan ketika itu. Untuk makluman Yang Berhormat, Y.Bhg. Ketua Setiausaha Negara telah pun melaksanakan keputusan Mesyuarat Jemaah Menteri yang dimaksudkan iaitu berhubung 4 surat sokongan daripada Y.B. Menteri Pengangkutan ketika itu.

Nazri’s answers are most unsatisfactory and unacceptable, in particular his answer that the Chief Secretary, Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan had carried out the Cabinet decision in July 2007 to conduct an inquiry as to how the four Letters of Support were issued unlawfully and to take the necessary disciplinary actions against the culprits who have now landed the country with the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal.

If the Chief Secretary had carried out the Cabinet decision in July 2007, there would have been no need for him now to head any PKFZ special task force into PKFZ scandal, as those responsible for abuse of power, criminal breach of trust and malpractices would have already been brought to court to face the full force of the law.

Last Thursday, Sidek issued his first statement as Chairman of the PKFZ Special Task Force – more than two months after its formation by the Cabinet in early September – stating that it agreed that the Transport Ministry asked the Board of Directors of the Port Klang Authority (PKA) to consider the recommendations by the Corporate Governance Ad Hoc Committee on the PKFZ project created by the Ministry earlier.

Sidek said the recommendations could be implemented without involving any amendments to the law.

This was decided by the Special Task Force in its third meeting held on Nov 2.

Sidek said the meeting was also informed of the action taken by the Royal Malaysia Police and the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) so far, with the MACC investigation into the PKFZ scandal expected to be completed by the end of the year.

The Cabinet Special Task Force appears to be acting like a postman or reporter than as an alternative to a Royal Commission of Inquiry not only to get to the bottom of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal but to bring to book the culprits for landing the country with the “mother-of-all-scandals”.

If Sidek had carried out the Cabinet decision of July 2007 to take all necessary action against the culprits responsible for the PKFZ scandal, including former Transport Ministers and Port Klang Authority officers, the PKFZ scandal would not have reached the present magnitude. Furthermore, there would be no need for the Cabinet to establish any Special Task Force to do what should have been done under the Cabinet decision of July 2007.

Undoubtedly, one reason why Malaysia’s has suffered the ignominy of the worst ranking and score in 15 years in Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2009 must be traced directly to the failure of the Chief Secretary in discharging the task entrusted on him by the Cabinet in July 2007 with regard to the PKFZ scandal.

Isn’t this testimony of the failure, ineffectiveness and impotence of MACC and its predecessor ACA?

These are the questions I posed to the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz in the ten minutes he touched on corruption in the government winding-up on the budget before he ended his reply for lunch-break today.

I remarked that Nazri was defending the status quo of a worsening corruption problem in Malaysia instead of spearheading an attack on corruption, as is happening in Indonesia.

Nazri was in his classic mode of denial and also disagreed that there is need for a parliamentary motion to adopt the PAC report on the PKFZ scandal for all MPs to take a stand on the PAC recommendations.

Earlier in his reply, Nazri created an uproar when he said that V.K. Lingam of “correct, correct, correct” infamy had not broken any law in brokering the appointment of judges.

As Malaysian Insider reported:

Now Nazri says VK Lingam broke no law
By Syed Jaymal Zahiid

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 9 — Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz sparked an uproar in Parliament today when he said “judiciary fixer” V.K. Lingam had been let off the hook “because he had broken no law”.

Nazri also suggested that Lingam breached no laws as he might “have just acted to fix the appointment of judges as if he was brokering the appointment of senior judges to impress people”.

“I am not denying that it was Lingam in the tape. But I am also saying that there are a lot of conmen in this world. Who knows he might have just acted when he was calling the so-called judges to impress,” said Nazri in his ministerial winding-up speech on the 2010 Budget debate.

Nazri argued that from the legal perspective Lingam could have merely made a suggestion as to who should be appointed to senior posts in the judiciary.

“I am here to stress that there is nothing to stop the prime minister from receiving suggestions from any parties. Should anyone act to advise the prime minister on the appointment of judges, this act itself cannot be taken as an offence.

“Unless it’s clear that the action (by Lingam) was clearly aimed at conspiring to subvert the judiciary or made to get favours… (but) the findings of the commission found none of this,” said the minister.

Opposition MPs had during the debate session demanded answers as to why the Attorney-General had decided to take “no further action” towards Lingam despite the findings of a royal commission set up to probe the infamous “correct, correct, correct” video recording that allegedly saw the senior lawyer brokering the appointment of judges.

The royal commission had proposed that action be taken against Lingam and several others purportedly involved in the recording including former Chief Justice Tun Eusoff Chin, Tun Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim and tycoon Tan Sri Vincent Tan, a close friend of former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Nazri revealed that investigations by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) on the figures named also found no conclusive evidence that there was any form of power abuse by any of them.

His remarks invited scathing criticism from the opposition benches.

How can MACC convince Malaysians that it is now a Malaysian version of Hong Kong’s ICAC (Independent Commission Against Corruption) when all it has demonstrated is its overzealousness and even abuses of power in investigating a RM2,400 Pakatan Rakyat state assembly constituency allocation resulting in the mysterious death of Teoh Beng Hock, while it has completely nothing to show and totally impotent in the RM12.5 billion PKFZ “mother of all scandals’?

An exchange between Public Accounts Committee (PAC) member and DAP Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua and the MACC Chief Commissioner Datuk Seri Ahmad Said Hamdan at the PAC meeting on 23rd June 2009 highlighted the hypocrisy of the MACC.

This happened when Ahmad Said hid behind the secrecy provisions of the MACC Act to refuse to disclose any details about the outcome of MACC investigations into the PKFZ scandal.

This led to an outburst by Pua protesting at Ahmad Said’s refusal to give any information to the PAC about MACC investigations into the PKFZ scandal, pointing out that Ahmad Said had no such qualms when he had said publicly that MACC had “good and strong evidence” of corruption against the Selangor Mentri Besar Tan Sri Abdul Khalid over the “car and cow” controversy.

As Pua rightly told Ahmad Said at the PAC exchange, what the MACC Chief Commissioner did amounted to “contempt” of Parliament.

Led by the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, those who had spoken of action under the Official Secrets Act include the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin, the Attorney-General Tan Sri Gani Patail, the Deputy Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Ismail Omar and Director of Commercial Criminal Investigation Department, Datuk Koh Hong Sun.

However, none of them has shown any concern about the right to know of Malaysians about the hows and whys the taxpayers are being burdened with the “mother of all scandals” – the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal running through three Prime Ministers, three Finance Ministers and four Port Klang Authority Chairmen.

Najib said: “We will inform the people what we should concerning the case and we will do so later but that is no excuse to reveal cabinet papers.”

The question Najib has failed to answer is why the Cabinet papers on the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal should continue to be kept as secret documents instead of being declassified, unless the Barisan Nasional has skeletons in the cupboard which must be kept hidden from public knowledge and scrutiny.

As former member of the Cabinet, the Chairman of Public Accounts Committee, Datuk Azmi Khalid would have access and digested the Cabinet documents on the PKFZ scandal.

Why didn’t the PAC, under his chairmanship, summon the Chief Secretary Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan to appear to help the PAC inquiry into the PKFZ scandal and testify as to the information given to the Ministers and the decisions taken by the Cabinet on the issue?

Shouldn’t the PAC take a stand that all the Cabinet documents and papers relating to the PKFZ scandal should be declassified not only for full study by the PAC buit also by all MPs and the Malaysian public – unless there are skeletons which must be kept hidden?

In the PAC hearing on August 12, the Attorney-General Gani Patail had made clear his position that the four Letters of Support issued by the two previous Transport Ministers Tun Dr. Ling Liong Sik and Tan Sri Chan Kong Choy from 2003 – 2006 for the RM4 billion bonds by the PKFZ turnkey contractor Kuala Dimensi Sdn. Bhd (KDSB) – and which has landed the government with the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal – were in fact Letters of Guarantee and had been unlawfully issued.

The next logical question is why the Attorney-General did not prosecute the two former Transport Ministers for unlawfully issuing the four Letters of Support landing the taxpayers with the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal?

This is the question which the Attorney-General and the government leadership should be answering instead of running after Raja Petra and Malaysia-Today under the Official Secrets Act for their role as whistleblowers.

Ong has his theories as to how such a Singapore Straits Times report came about but Malaysians are only interested in whether as the Transport Minister who had unlawfully issued three of the four Letters of Support for the issue of multi-billion ringgit bonds by the PKFZ turnkey contractor, Kuala Dimensi Sdn. Bhd (KDSB), resulting in the Malaysian government and taxpayers being burdened with the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal, is Chan Kong Choy innocent or implicated in the PKFZ scandal.

As I had said when I unsuccessfully moved a motion of censure against Kong Choy as Transport Minister during the budget debate on 27th November 2007 when I proposed a RM10 salary cut against him, it is completely unacceptable for Kong Choy to say that he did not know that he did not have the power as Transport Minister to issue such Letters of Support, especially as Kong Choy was Deputy Finance Minister for close to four years from Dec. 1999 to June 2003.

If a bank officer who exceeds his authority in a loan approval by a few hundred thousand ringgit could be prosecuted under the Banking and Financial Institutions Act for jeopardizing public funds why should a Minister who exceeded his authority by committing public funds measured in terms of billions of ringgit go scot-free and need not be accountable, and even more serious, could get his unauthorized and illegal acts ratified retrospectively – creating the monster of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal for 27 million Malaysians today!

Is there no one at the Ministerial and Cabinet level who need to be held responsible and accountable for the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal?

Is the “super task force” headed by Chief Secretary Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan as announced by the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak on Wednesday empowered to zero in on the culprits responsible at Ministerial and Cabinet level for the “heinous crime” of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal or is its ulterior agenda to sanitize, minimize or expunge whatever governmental, Ministerial and political fall-outs from the PKFZ scandal?

Why didn’t the Cabinet establish a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal to ensure a full inquiry and public accounting of the mother of all scandals – as the Gerakan President and KPI Minister, Tan Sri Dr. Koh Tsu Koon had belatedly given his support?

Unless convinced otherwise, I see the establishment of the so-called “super task force” into the PKFZ scandal as a major step backwards in public accountability and good governance, as it smacks of being a super “cover up” task force to get “the cat back into the bag” with specific reference to the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal.

What is the purpose of a super task force into the PKFZ scandal, which is to include the Attorney-General Tan Sri Gani Patail, the Treasury secretary-general Tan Sri Wan Abdul Aziz and representatives from Finance and Transport Ministries, after the the PKFZ scandal had ballooned from RM1.08 billion in 2002 to RM4.6 billion in 2006 and now set to become RM12.5 billion through three Transport Ministers and three Prime Ministers?

Will the super task force now make all other inquiries, whether by the Public Accounts Committee or the PricewaterhouseCoopers and various Port Klang Authority task forces subordinate and irrelevant?

After three years of persistent questioning inside and outside Parliament as well as the recent 108 questions of “three-queries-a-day” directed at the Transport Minister Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat, there have been some significant results in forcing into the public domain the gross and wide-ranging financial improprieties of the PKFZ “mother of all scandals” – although what has been made public is only the tip of an iceberg.

Will the super task force announced by Najib yesterday result in the PKFZ scandal again shrouded in secrecy and unaccountability?

Another query is why the Chief Secretary Sidek Hassan is now heading such an inquiry into the PKFZ scandal, and why he had failed to conduct such an inquiry earlier as this was resolved by the Cabinet in July 2007 when it decided on the RM4.6 billion bailout of PKFZ, including giving retrospective approval to the four illegal Letters of Support unlawfully given by the two previous Transport Ministers, Tun Dr. Ling Liong Sik and Tan Sri Chan Kong Choy which have landed the country in the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal.

There should be individual and collective Ministerial responsibility by the Cabinet members for the shocking decision yesterday to set up the so-called super task force, when the right course of action would be a Royal Commission of Inquiry to conduct a public and no-holds-barred investigation into the “mother of all scandals” in the nation’s history.

For a start, can Tsu Koon explain why he abandoned his support for a Royal Commission of Inquiry and instead accepted a super task force which might end up as a super “cover up” task force into the PKFZ scandal?

This is the first time since the long sorry saga of the PKFZ scandal, which ballooned from a RM1.08 billion scandal in 2002 under Tun Dr. Ling Liong Sik as Transport Minister to a RM4.6 billion scandal in 2006 under Tan Sri Chan Kong Choy as Transport Minister and is now set to mushroom to become a RM12.5 billion scandal under Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat as Transport Minister that a Federal Minister has acknowledged its gravity as to support the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry.

Can Tsu Koon do what Tee Keat has failed – getting Cabinet approval for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal to ensure that it will not go down in history as Barisan Nasional and the nation’s most “heinous crime without criminals”?

Or is Tsu Koon taking the easy way out from the mounting public pressure for “the whole truth and nothing but the truth” about the PKFZ scandal to be told, by publicly giving lip-service support to the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry, without doing his utmost as KPI Minister to get the Cabinet to make the crucial decision to set it up?

At present, the PKFZ scandal has become a political football in the Ong Tee Keat-Chua Soi Lek MCA power struggle but neither Ong nor Chua has evinced any full commitment to support the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry to go far beyond the present limited inquiries which are restricted to the Port Klang Authority (PKA) and PKFZ levels instead of a no-holds-barred investigation going as high as necessary, even Ministerial and Cabinet levels.

Not only the former Transport Ministers Liong Sik and Kong Choy and former MCA PKA chairmen should be summoned as witnesses in the public inquiry, even former Prime Ministers Tun Mahathir and Tun Abdullah should be sub-poenaed too.

The Singapore Straits Times reported today that a confidential report by the government task force on the PKFZ scandal which had been handed over to the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and will be on the agenda of the Cabinet tomorrow, had identified serious breaches on the part of several government officials, including former Transport Minister, Tan Sri Chong Kong Choy.

This has made a Cabinet decision tomorrow to establish a Royal Commission of Inquiry even more imperative or the present Cabinet would be guilty of the biggest cover-up of the biggest financial scandal in the nation’s history.

Tsu Koon, Tee Keat and all the other Ministers of the Najib Cabinet are facing their first and greatest test of integrity since April – whether they are prepared to send out a clear and unmistakable message that there will be no more cover-up of financial scandals in the country, particularly one which is five times bigger than the first big financial scandal of the Mahathir administration – the RM2.5 billion Bumiputra Malaysia Finance Scandal!

The deputy CEO of KDSB Datuk Faizal Abdullah has issued an ultimatum to the Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat to produce Lee’s appointment letter as PKA Chairman by 4.30 pm tomorrow (Monday) or face the legal consequences.

According to Faizal, the statutory power or prerogative to appoint the Chairman of PKA is vested with the Yang di Pertuan Agong as provided under the Port Klang Authority Act 1960 and the Minister of Transport has no power to personally decide to extend Lee’s tenure as PKA Chairman at the end of April.

Faizal contended that if Lee’s appointment as PKA Chairman was unlawfully renewed by the Transport Minister and not by the Yang di Pertuan Agong, then Lee’s appointment is null and void and all “tasks and responsibilities” handled by Lee after March 31 this year, when his first appointment expired, would be null and void, including:

*

The publication of the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PcW) audit report on the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal;
*

The various committees set up by PKA following the PcW report and various decisions taken, in particular the PKFZ special task force which reported on the RM500 million to RM1 billion KDSB billing discrepancies and irregularities, leading to the lodging of police report and institution of legal proceedings by PKA against KDSB.

I do not know whether Lee’s appointment as PKA Chairman is lawful or valid, whether Faizal is right that Lee’s appointment had not bee renewed by the Yang di Pertuan Agong as required by law.

But what is very clear is a very blatant attempt by KDSB to block any disclosure and public accountability of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ, the “mother of all scandals” in the nation’s 52-year history in utter disregard of the national interests to promote accountability, transparency, integrity and good governance.

I have differences with Ong Tee Keat and I have been pursuing him both inside and outside Parliament for full and unexpurgated disclosure of the PKFZ scandal, to the extent that I had bombed him with three questions a day for 36 days and 108 questions.

My major difference with Ong is that he is not prepared to make full and total disclosure of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal, not just at the Port Klang Authority level but all the way to the level of the Transport Minister and the Cabinet.

However, Ong can depend on my full support to oppose attempts by KDSB to put the lid to block accountability and exposure of the causes of the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal, as the limited opening up of the PKFZ scandal must not be rolled back and covered up when what is needed is further opening up of the PKFZ “can of worms” and “swamp of crocodiles”.

(Speech at the DAP Air Puteh Branch dinner at Han Chiang Secondary School Penang on Sunday, 16th August 2009 at 9 pm)

In announcing this, MACC Deputy Commissioner Datuk Abu Kassim Mohamad said the MACC task force would investigate the findings of an earlier special task force set up to probe the legal and financial aspects of the controversial project – the 370-page report with 2,500 appendices made by the special task force comprising Skrine partner Lim Chee Wee, PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services (PwCAS) managing director Chin Kwai Fatt and PwCAS senior executive director Lim San Peen.

The special task force found that there was possible fraud, unsubstantiated claims and over-charging by Kuala Dimensi Sdn Bhd, the PKFZ turnkey developer, ranging from RM500 million to RM1 billion.

The immediate response of everyone reading Abu Kassim’s announcement is the question why the MACC (and previously the Anti-Corruption Agency) had failed to charge anyone for the PKFZ scandal although the first report on the PKFZ scandal was lodged with the ACA some four years ago!

The ACA and later MACC had the opportunity to “clean house” in the RM12.5 billion PKFZ scandal but it failed in a colossal manner.

Can the MACC Chief Commissioner furnish any satisfactory explanation for such a colossal failure?

A public inquiry is fully warranted as to why MACC (previously ACA) failed to charge anyone although the first report on PKFZ was lodged some four years ago.

Furthermore, the Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat should explain why the report of the special task force into the legal and financial aspects of PKFZ, on the basis of which the Port Klang Authority (PKA) had lodged a police report, had not been made public in accordance with the principles of accountability, transparency and integrity?