The recent revelations in an ongoing court case involving Ultra Kirana Sdn Bhd’s (UKSB) secret ledger have underscored the need for a political financing law, political economist Edmund Terence Gomez said.
He said there have been many corruption cases, of late, involving politicians who were exonerated of the charges after saying the money received was a case of political donation.
“In the cases that occurred, they were allowed to be freed of the charge because there is no law against political donation.
“(But) if you look at the volume of money involved, it is stupendous and this stupendous amount of money has not been given without any expectations of a return of some sort, a quid pro quo.
“The other issue here is that there have been allegations that when the money was paid, it was to support some of their business activities, as seen in the UKSB case. Obviously, this indicates abuse of power, whichever way you look at it.
“There must be proper legislation to stop this from occurring because it is clearly widespread,” Gomez (above) told Malaysiakini.
What is MACC doing?
He noted that it is of concern that these political donations appear to have gone into the personal accounts of the politicians, particularly those sitting in government. The party which should be receiving the donations also does not appear to be aware of them.
“MACC should be aware of all these donations that have been made because it’s been coming up repeatedly in court cases.
“Why haven’t there been further investigations or any exposes even by them (MACC) about all these political donations going on?” Gomez questioned.
Several prominent politicians were implicated recently when witnesses testified during the graft trial of Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi involving the foreign visa system (VLN) in the High Court in Shah Alam, Selangor.
The secret UKSB ledger, which contained code names and details of alleged payments of kickbacks made by the company to several individuals between 2014 and 2018, was submitted in court as evidence.
The names involved include Perikatan Nasional chairperson Muhyiddin Yassin, Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin and Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein, among others.
While the MACC has said it will open investigation papers into this matter after the testimony, questions have been raised as to why the agency did not do so earlier as the evidence and the witness were prepared by them.
Abuse of GLCs
On a separate matter, Gomez also questioned why the MACC has yet to open an investigation into the abuse of government-linked companies (GLCs), as seen in the case involving then chief secretary to the government, Mohd Sidek Hassan, who was a member of 1MDB’s board of advisers.
“By his own admission, Sidek was given a huge stipend for doing nothing.
“Why has there been no investigation into this matter, too, that members of the board of (advisers) of GLCs are being given huge stipends for doing nothing?
“What Sidek has disclosed is not something we didn’t know. It is probably a practice that’s been going on for some time but not brought out to the open,” he added.
This is another example of abuse of institutions that the MACC should be looking into, he said.
Gomez also believes that Sidek should return the funds he received as he himself admitted he did not attend any of the meetings yet continued to receive the stipend as a member of the board of advisers.
On June 7, Sidek testified during the 1MDB corruption trial against former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak.
He said Najib had appointed him as a member of 1MDB’s board of advisers because he thought Sidek’s salary, as then chief secretary to the government, was too low.
Sidek said he had been informed he would be getting a monthly advisory fee of RM30,000 for his post.
However, he stressed that during his tenure, nobody from 1MDB ever gave him a briefing or discussion about issues, matters of investment and company operations related to the fund. - Mkini
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