Although repeatedly accused of plagiarism, Utusan Malaysiacolumnist Ridhuan Tee has been promoted from an ordinary lecturer to a professor at Universiti Pertahanan Nasional Malaysia (UPNM), revealed his former colleague today.

Ariffin Omar, now a DAP senator from Penang, told a press conference at the Parliament lobby that the accusations that Ridhuan was plagiarising other people's writing for his academic work was actually investigated by the university.

"But the vice chancellor didn't take it seriously and instead he was promoted. It was like a big slap on the face of academicians," he added.

Ariffin taught Strategic Studies in UPNM between 2010 to early 2013, and was at the university when Ridhuan was promoted in early 2012, allegedly owing to a plagiarised academic work he wrote in 2010.

Seputeh MP Teresa Kok, also from DAP, who was present at the press conference, said that Ridhuan plagiarised the work of a certain Airil Yasreen Mohd Yassin for his 2010 academic work.

She showed proof that the original article was posted on Airil's blog in 2009, and that Ridhuan even plagiarised grammatical errors which appeared in the original article, and at times, copying an entire paragraph or page.

The academic work was about the importance of the postgraduate research, Kok showed.

She also expressed her unhappiness with the fact that the Education Ministry and UPNM have yet to act on the matter though it has been raised by MIC back in March itself and was also raised by Kok in her budget speech on Nov 7.

"We will write to the Education Ministry after this to pursue this matter further," she said.

Known for his right-wing views, Ridhuan's articles in Utusan Malaysiahave drawn flak on more than one occasion.