See-To: No one said Selangor gov't sold land in Ijok, but why was it returned?

BN strategic communications deputy director Eric See-To today told the Selangor Menteri Besar's Office that no one had ever accused the Selangor state government of selling land in Ijok.

Instead, See-To said the question is why the land was returned to developers.   

"And that is precisely the problem. If the Selangor government had sold off the land and not returned the land, we would not be having this conversation today.

"The real question is not that Selangor sold the land but why Selangor returned the land," said See-To in a statement today.

He was responding to Selangor Menteri Besar’s Office strategic communications director Yin Shao Loong, who said that the state government did not surrender any land in the Ijok area.

This is after See-To claimed that third parties received RM262.7 million from the RM1.18 billion Ijok land deal in Selangor, almost as much as settlers, who were given RM300 million.

Shopping mall analogy

Yin had previously clarified that the land in Ijok was separated into two parcels of land, that are Alam Perdana, which was reacquired by the Selangor government in 2010, and Alam Mutiara and Alam Utama, which remained private land.

He had said this private land is the subject of the RM1.18 billion deal, and not Alam Perdana.

“Not all land in Ijok is in the same location. It is like if I own Pavilion (shopping centre), but people start screaming at me when KL Plaza and Sungei Wang (shopping centres) get sold,” Yin had said.

See-To, however, questioned Yin's logic in the matter.

"Let us paraphrase him to tell you of the true situation. It's like you got Pavilion (shopping centre) from two cronies who owed the state government money and people start to scream why you returned Pavilion to the two cronies even though you had legally won it twice.

"Now, people are also screaming why your written condition of returning it is that the two cronies can only sell it to one particular buyer and that another condition is that a large part of the sales money has to be paid to certain third parties, many of whom have now been arrested by MACC."

See-To said the scandal had always been about the state government returning the Ijok land to "two crony companies" before the federal court case had even started, despite the Selangor government winning the first two cases over the ownership of the land.

"The menteri besar office's answer in saying that they did not sell any land in Ijok makes a mockery of the Pakatan leaders and the menteri besar office's multiple past statements to defend the return of the Ijok land.

"Merely brushing off that they did not sell the Ijok land means that all these Pakatan politicians and the menteri besar office had been defending the wrong land in the past.

Malaysiakini has contacted Yin for comment and is awaiting his response.

MACC recently arrested several people over their connection to the Ijok land deal, four of whom were from a consulting firm.

In a joint statement yesterday, PKR’s Subang MP R Sivarasa, Amanah's Shah Alam MP Khalid Samad and former Kuala Selangor MP Dzulkefly Ahmad described the arrests as “unnecessary”.

They had said that the consulting firm had helped resolve the dispute over the land through an amicable solution for everyone. -Mkini