MP: Billing to PMO not evidence of wrongdoing

Evidence claiming that the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) footed Najib Abdul Razak's daughter's engagement party has been shot down by Kota Belud MP Abdul Rahman Dahlan.

The banquet event order (BEO) released by PKR strategy director Rafizi Ramli, he said, cannot be equated with public funds being used for the party.

"They underlined the words 'billed to PMO' in red (in the BEO)... 'Billed to PMO' means sending the bill to the PMO. It doesn't mean the PMO paid the bills. Where is the prime minister's office? In the PMO.

"For example, if I enter into an agreement to buy a car and they ask where to send the bill, I tell them to send it to my service centre.

"Does it mean my service centre is paying for it? My office is there," Rahman (right) said after a briefing for parliamentarians from the BN in Kuala Lumpur last night.

Rahman, who had hours earlier argued with Rafizi over Twitter, chastised the latter for demanding that Najib producesevidence to prove his innocence.

"Where in the world do you have this kind of situation where someone accuses another, and then the accused has to produce evidence?" he said.

‘MACC report not licence for smearing'

If Rafizi, through NGO Jingga 13, has deliberately misled the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) with the document, Rahman said, then Rafizi would be liable for a RM100,000 fine or 10 years' jail or both under Section 27 of the MACC Act.

He also criticised the opposition coalition for its 'habit' of holding press conferences immediately after lodging a MACC report.

"The MACC is fair to the accused and the accuser... Section 29 of the MACC Act clearly states that when you make your report to MACC, it is an offence to tell the whole world.

"What happens if the person is not guilty? Then he has been smeared and his reputation is in tatters."

Rafizi claimed last Friday that the BEO from Shangri-La Hotel, which showed a sum of RM409,767 billed to the PMO, as evidence that the government had paid for the prime minister's private event.

Based on this document. PKR-linked Jingga 13 lodged a report with the MACC, but the PMO has denied that public funds were used for the party.