Reinstate Azrul, Bank Islam urged

About 100 academics and activists from 51 NGOs come out in solid support of the suspended Bank Islam chief economist

KUALA LUMPUR: About 100 academics and activists have shown support for suspended Bank Islam chief economist Azrul Azwar Ahmad Tajuddin for saying Pakatan Rakyat will form the next federal government after the upcoming general election.

“We, call on Bank Islam to reinstate its chief economist who has been suspended for presenting an analysis based on computer simulation which projects a probability weighted base-case scenario of Pakatan Rakyat’s victory in the 13th General Election.

“We hold that Bank Islam acted unprofessionally, unjustly and without any basis by reportedly punishing Azrul for his professional opinion, presented at the Regional Outlook Forum on Jan 10, 2013.

“We understand that the Azrul had generated a best- and worst-case scenario for Barisan Nasional in the coming general elections. For the record, no party has produced any methodical rebuttal to his analysis,” the group said in a joint statement.

Yesterday, a pro-Umno blogger alleged that Azrul was a mole who supplied Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim with sensitive information.

Ahirudin Attan, who runs a blog called Rocky’s Bru, said this was the reason why Anwar, his daughter and Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah and PKR chief strategist Rafizi Ramli were “visibly and terribly upset” over Azrul’s suspension from the bank.

Suspended indefinitely

Azrul hit the limelight recently for outlining three possible post-GE scenarios at a regional forum in Singapore in his capacity as Bank Islam chief economist. One of the three scenarios included Pakatan Rakyat winning the next general election.

Bank Islam sought to distance itself from its chief economist after the news broke out, and shortly afterwards suspended his service indefinitely, citing breach of internal policy.

“Consistent with the view of financial regulators and academics worldwide, we stress that information freedom is pertinent to the resource allocation mechanism of the financial markets.

“Freedom of expression and freedom of information are the best way to expose and correct any falsehood or misinformation. Analyses on elections and their economic and financial consequences are clearly of paramount importance for the markets and the country.

“By allegedly suppressing Mr Azrul Azwar’s professional opinion that was unfavourable to Barisan Nasional, maliciously labelled as “political comments”, Bank Islam is admitting that the bank has a policy of reporting only Barisan Nasional favourable news,” the group said.

The group called on Bank Islam to immediately reinstate Azrul  to his position and manage its business professionally.

“We also urge the BN government to join our call for Bank Islam to reinstate him. This will prove beyond doubt that the BN government has not pressured Bank Islam to suspend Azrul and Prime Minister  Najib  Tun Razak is genuinely committed to reforms.