Raja Petra also wants the state government to explain if there is favouritism in giving legal works to a small group of lawyers who are also PKR leaders
PETALING JAYA: Taking up a challenge posed by the PKR-led Selangor government, popular blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin today revealed two cases of alleged abuse of power in the state administration.
The first case involved the brother-in-law of PKR deputy chief Azmin Ali while the other involved several lawyers who are also leaders in the party.
Posting the details of the corruption and conflict of interest in his Malaysia-Today webportal today, Raja Petra said the state government can start investigating these two cases first.
In the first case, Raja Petra claimed that Azmin Ali’s brother-in-law, Johan Taharin had approached a Chinese developer to help gain state approvals for a project, for a fee.
“The developer asked Johan how can they be assured that they would get approval once they paid the money? Can they instead pay after the approval has been obtained rather than pay upfront? After all, they are talking about a few million here, not a small amount of money.
“Johan told the developer that he is representing Azmin Ali and if required he can bring them to meet Azmin so that Azmin can personally give them his assurance. They replied they will think about it,” wrote Raja Petra in his article titled ‘Just DO IT, not DUIT!’.
Raja Petra said the developer did not pay the money, and as a result his project never took off.
“…he swore he was going to campaign against Pakatan Rakyat in the coming general election,” added Raja Petra.
Raja Petra said that he was ready to convince the developer to come public on the matter if the Selangor government was ready to cooperate with the Malaysian Anti Corruption Commission
to ensure that the identity of the whistleblower is protected.
“This whistleblower is a Chinese and a developer who depends on state approvals for his company’s projects. So, invariably, he is very concerned about his business being disrupted or sabotaged if his identity is revealed.”
Conflict of interest
In the second case, one which involved alleged conflicts of interest, Raja Petra said legal matters involving the Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) were being given to a group of lawyers who are all PKR leaders.
He said that the MBPJ’s act of favouritism has caused immense unhappiness amongst the other Pakatan Rakyat councillors. He added that these unhappy councillors have decided to remain silent for the sake of ‘party unity’.
Raja Petra named MBPJ councillors Derek Fernandez and Lateefa Koya, MP for Subang R Sivarasa, and PKR vice president of N Surendran as the group of favoured lawyers.
“A good chunk of the legal work in MBPJ has been diverted to the firms of Sivarasa, Surendran and Fernandez through the influence of Lateefa Koya and Derek.
“After all, this is a PKR-controlled council. Is this not corruption, or at least a conflict of interest?”
He said that MBPJ has to be transparent and reveal the exact amount of work given to these lawyers and the total fees paid over the few years that Pakatan Rakyat has ruled Selangor.
He also said that PKR supremo Anwar Ibrahim was fully aware of this but had done nothing about it.
“Let us start with these two cases while I gather the evidence for the other cases, which I will reveal in due course,” he added.
In a series of interviews with the mainstream media earlier this week, Raja Petra had, among others, highlighted that corruption was still rampant in Selangor as it has been under the Barisan Nasional rule. He added that people had to pay “under table” money to get things done in the state.
The state government reacted angrily by stating that Raja Petra was making wild accusations to undermine it.
Selangor Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim’s political secretary Faekah Husin also offered to pay travel fare for Raja Petra to come to state secretariat to provide more information on his claims.
Khalid meanwhile told reporters on Wednesday that Raja Petra need to furnish evidence on his claims
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