Salleh fights innuendo with innuendo
The Sabah Speaker brings up the question of Petronas’ purchase of a company owned by Mahathir’s son.
(Free Malaysia Today) – In his continuing defence of Prime Minister Najib Razak against Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s attacks, Sabah Speaker Salleh Said Keruak has decided to fight what he calls an “innuendo” with another innuendo dredged up from the late 1990s.
In his latest blog posting, Salleh acknowledges that Mahathir has not directly accused Najib of any wrongdoing in bringing up the question of his stepson’s wealth.
He agrees that Mahathir was “just asking Najib to explain what is going on”.
“While that is not an outright allegation of misconduct,” he says, “it is certainly what we would call an innuendo. That, in fact, is a very effective method to raise doubts regarding someone’s integrity and honesty.”
Salleh recalled that Mahathir himself was the subject of innuendos in 1998 and 1999 over the issue of Petronas buying over a shipping company owned by his son Mirzan, which the opposition decried as a bailout.
“Dr Mahathir was clearly upset that Anwar Ibrahim, the then Finance Minister, refused to consider the RM2 billion that he (the son) wanted and instead asked Petronas to do a valuation of the company’s net worth,” Salleh says.
“Petronas then came up with a valuation of only RM1 billion. So his son had to take a ‘loss’ of RM1 billion, complained Dr Mahathir. But Petronas made a profit when it later sold the company for more than RM1 billion, Dr Mahathir argued. So it was a good deal for Petronas.
“Dr Mahathir did not respond to the opposition’s question of where his son got the money from, whether RM1 billion or RM2 billion, to buy the company. Of course one can always raise funds through loans and investors.
“The fact that Dr Mahathir was the Prime Minister and Petronas comes directly under the Prime Minister and, according to the Petroleum Development Act, Petronas reports directly to the Prime Minister and not to Parliament, makes this matter a serious conflict of interest.
“But the matter was decided by the Finance Minister and not by the Prime Minister, explained Dr Mahathir. Hence Dr Mahathir cannot be accused of any wrongdoing or conflict of interest since Anwar made the decision. Anwar, however, said that he was forced to make the decision because of the gun at his head.
“So you see how one’s integrity and honesty can be easily put to doubt by innuendos. And Dr Mahathir who suffered this should be the one person who should know this.”
