Govt not protecting anyone from corruption charges, says PM

 

Replying to opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob denied the government is protecting certain people or prosecuting only certain individuals.

PETALING JAYA: The government is fully committed to tackling corruption and does not practise selective prosecution, Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob told the Dewan Rakyat today.

Replying to opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s claim that Malaysia’s drop in the latest Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) rankings was due to the government’s lack of political will to address the issue, Ismail highlighted the numerous ongoing corruption cases in court involving political leaders.

“It doesn’t matter if they are from the government or opposition.

“This (the court cases) shows that the government is serious in taking action against anyone suspected to be involved in corruption.

“The government is not protecting anyone,” said Ismail.

“Whoever responsible will be brought to court and the court will decide whether they are guilty or not.

“One cannot say that the government is protecting certain people or prosecuting certain individuals.

“We don’t know if there was selective prosecution in the past, but today, there is no selective prosecution of anyone.

“That is the government’s promise.”

Earlier, Anwar had asked Ismail to clarify why the country’s CPI ranking had dropped,.

He claimed this was because the government had “no political will” to deal with exposes, such as the Pandora Papers leaks, adding that the 1MDB scandal had yet to be resolved.

The Pandora Papers refer to a series of leaked documents that outline the offshore dealings of a number of high-profile global figures.

Malaysians named in the leak include finance minister Tengku Zafrul Aziz, Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, and the family of fugitive businessman and central 1MDB figure Low Taek Jho.

In January, Transparency International Malaysia (TI-M) said Malaysia had dropped five spots to 62nd out of the 100 countries in TI’s annual CPI ranking.

The anti-graft watchdog said Malaysia’s ranking was the lowest since the methodology was revised in 2012.

While Anwar hailed the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) efforts to combat corruption, the Port Dickson MP warned that the drop in the CPI rankings would hurt the country’s image unless it was addressed by the government.

“Why is there no willingness from leaders, especially the prime minister, to state that the MACC would act decisively against anyone?” - FMT