Tiong: Paper prompted to run false report
(NST) – Datuk Seri Tiong King Sing, who is facing a RM500 million defamation suit, slammed a newspaper for reporting that there was no evidence that he had given a RM10 million donation to MCA president Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat for party activities.
Tiong, the Kuala Dimensi Sdn Bhd (KDSB) chief executive officer, said the credibility of the report, carried by a local English daily on Wednesday, was dubious as it did not quote any senior Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission official.
The MACC, in a separate statement, denied that its officials had said they had found no evidence to back Tiong’s claims that he had given the money to Ong.
The two-paragraph statement, issued by the MACC’s Putrajaya headquarters, stressed that investigations were still on-going and urged all parties to stop speculating on the case.
In a not-so-subtle reference to Ong, who filed the suit, Tiong claimed that a certain party had “prompted” the newspaper to run the report in the hope of gaining support going into MCA’s extraordinary general meeting this Saturday.
“It is an attempt to influence the outcome of that meeting. It is probably also an attempt to give credence to his reputation and gain support,” he said in a statement.
Tiong, who is also the MP for Bintulu and Barisan Nasional backbenchers club chairman, said the commission’s office had gone to his office on Tuesday to follow up investigations on his alleged donation to the MCA through Ong.
He said he had given MACC officers additional documents relating to their investigations, and stressed that he was ever ready to help with any request to speed up the probe.
Tiong, however, did not comment on another article in the newspaper claiming that KDSB’s assets were frozen by police in their investigations into the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) debacle, where KDSB is alleged to have made up to RM1.5 billion in excessive claims.
On Wednesday, the newspaper front-paged a report claiming transactions on some of KDSB’s assets, including a luxury jet, were frozen to make way for police investigations into the PKFZ scandal.
A separate report on the same day also claimed that the MACC had not found any evidence that Ong had received the RM10 million political contribution on behalf of MCA from Tiong.
In early September, police froze several of KDSB’s accounts holding over RM140 million as they were deemed crucial in assisting investigations into the case.
KDSB, the turnkey contractor for the 405-hectare transshipment hub, has been accused of overcharging and making unsubstantiated claims in the controversial PKFZ project.
The company denied the charge, and is facing two lawsuits filed by the Port Klang Authority claiming a total amount of over RM1.6 billion.
