Public not fully aware of widespread graft in country, says Mat Sabu

 

Amanah president Mohamad Sabu says the people will suffer if corruption remains rampant.

PETALING JAYA: The people are still not fully aware of the “rampant” corruption in the country, Amanah president Mohamad Sabu said.

He said that when Pakatan Harapan (PH) came to power in 2018, he was shocked to discover the widespread corruption that had taken root during Barisan Nasional’s (BN) 60-year rule.

“I was shocked to find out that when we investigated all the corruption claims, it was way worse than we imagined.

“We now have the littoral combat ship (LCS) scandal, and we still haven’t received a single ship. If corruption is still rampant, the public will suffer,” the former defence minister said at a ceramah in Johor last night.

The LCS project has come under scrutiny after the Public Accounts Committee released a detailed report in August which, among other things, found that not a single ship had been completed although Putrajaya had already spent RM6 billion.

Mohamad, fondly known as Mat Sabu, also said many Malay-based parties had a tendency to bring up racial and religious issues to criticise their political rivals and make baseless allegations.

He cited claims that DAP had planned to shut down the Islamic development department and change the official religion of Malaysia as examples, labelling them as untrue.

“DAP has signed an agreement that it would never change the Federal Constitution,” he said.

Separately, Amanah mobilisation director Sany Hamzan criticised PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang for claiming that DAP was “pro-communist”.

He said if Hadi or his party believed the claim to be true, they should launch an investigation into DAP.

“Many in the government only care about using race and religion (to discredit other parties) because they have no other issues to talk about,” he said.

In a series of tweets, Hadi had said DAP should be opposed as it was “pro-communist”, adding that communists “terrorise more than the Christian and Jewish colonisers”.

At the same ceramah, DAP election director Liew Chin Tong said PH’s advantage in the coming general election was the diverse support it could attract from the public.

“PH gets support from the Chinese, Indians, Malays and those from Sarawak and Sabah,” he said. “Not many coalitions get support from all the communities.” - FMT