UPDATED Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim slammed his former boss Mahathir Mohamad, who a day ago had accused him of being involved in a citizen-for-votes scam in Sabah state, reiterating he had no knowledge of the project which Mahathir has admitted he ordered.
"Dr Mahathir is the past, he is obsolete, he attacks me everyday (but where is the proof)," Anwar told a press conference on Friday.
The 64-year-old head of the Pakatan Rakyat opposition coalition was speaking to reporters after welcoming a high-powered delegation from Palestine to his party headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.
Mahathir, who was prime minister as well as home minister during the tumultuous 1980s and 90s, has admitted the Sabah Project I.C. or Project M was his baby. But he claims he did nothing illegal in handing out citizenship to foreign workers in Sabah and even likened his action to that of first prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, who had offered citizenship to a million people mostly Chinese and Indians as part of a process in the gaining of independence from British colonial rulers in 1957.
Still willing to testify before Sabah RCI
According to Anwar, Project M did not end in the 1990s but continued during the administration of former prime minister Abdullah Badawi. And it is still ongoing, said Anwar, accusing current Prime Minister Najib Razak of using similar tactics at key states to cling to power.
"This task force was handled by the then PM Dr Mahathir Mohamad and his right-hand man Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin and the late Megat Junid Megat Ayub," Anwar said.
Aziz Shamsuddin had been Mahathir's political secretary, while Megat Junid was a former deputy minister in the federal Cabinet.
Anwar, who served as Deputy Prime Minister as well as Finance Minister in the 1990s, reiterated his willingness to testify at the ongoing Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Sabah scandal.
No proof, but still wants to smear Anwar
In the RCI, witnesses from the National Registration Department have come forward to testify that they received their instructions from Mahathir's political secretary Aziz Shamsuddin and the late Megat Junid, a deputy minister and well-known Mahathir loyalist.
Yet despite admitting he did not have any proof, Mahathir had told an economic forum on Thursday that Anwar was directly involved in Project M.
"He had a hand in it," said Mahathir, when asked if he ever ordered Anwar to issue identification cards to unqualified immigrants in Sabah. "He normally takes the initiative and sometimes do more (than is required). What happens on the ground is often different from the directive (from above)."
The 87-year-old was lambasted by PKR leaders, who took him to task for trying to do Anwar a back-handed turn.
"This is the spitefulness that Mahathir is famous for. He is just trying to sully and smear Anwar's name. Look at the sodomy charges he fabricated against Anwar to cover his RM30billion of forex losses and economic mismanagement - it is the same political dishonesty and ruthlessness," PKR head of disciplinary committee Tan Kee Kwong told Malaysia Chronicle.
Malaysia Chronicle
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