Facebook posts falsely accuse Anwar of appointing wife to fictitious job

 

The Prime Minister’s Office said Anwar Ibrahim had not appointed his wife, Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, to any official role and had no plans to do so. (Bernama pic)

KUALA LUMPUR: While Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim was rocked by accusations of nepotism for appointing his daughter as a senior adviser in January, Facebook posts falsely claimed that he had given his wife, Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, a job as “chairman of federal territories members of Parliament, federal territories department, Prime Minister’s Department”.

However, this role does not exist. The Prime Minister’s Office said Anwar had not appointed his wife to any official role and had no plans to do so.

“Congratulations on Anwar’s wife’s appointment,” read the caption of the Malay-language post, uploaded on Facebook on Jan 30.

The post, shared on a Facebook page with more than 282,000 followers, shows a photo of Wan Azizah, who is MP for the Bandar Tun Razak constituency in Kuala Lumpur.

The text accompanying the photo congratulates Wan Azizah on her “appointment as chairman of federal territories members of Parliament, federal territories department, Prime Minister’s Department”.

Anwar took office in November 2022 after decades as Malaysia’s leading opposition politician, during which he suffered a string of setbacks including being thrown in jail for corruption and sodomy – charges he said were politically motivated. His wife, Wan Azizah, became deputy prime minister in May 2018 – the first woman to hold the post in Malaysia.

The claim circulated as Anwar faced criticism for appointing his daughter Nurul Izzah as a senior economics and finance adviser.

While Nurul Izzah, a former lawmaker, said she would not be paid for her work, opposition leaders slammed her appointment as an example of the nepotism that Anwar had pledged to fight against.

The false posts generated hundreds of comments, with many social media users appearing to believe that Anwar had genuinely appointed his wife to the post.

“An entire family and relatives in the government, fantastic/amazing, Malaysia can,” one Facebook user commented.

“Can’t the MACC investigate this claim that the PM has appointed his family members into the federal administration?” asked another, referring to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.

Fabricated job title

The position of “chairman of federal territories members of Parliament, federal territories department, Prime Minister’s Department” does not exist.

After he took office, Anwar scrapped the federal territories ministerial portfolio and parked it under the Prime Minister’s Department (PMD), which means that the prime minister now oversees matters concerning the federal territories.

Following the restructuring of the federal territories ministry into a department, the government appointed Rosida Jaafar as its secretary-general.

The false claim appears to originate from Wan Azizah chairing a meeting for MPs representing federal territories in Kuala Lumpur on Jan 19.

“Wan Azizah was recently asked to chair a meeting for federal territories MPs and they were hoping to create a secretariat – not a committee or a council under any government agencies – to better manage issues arising in their respective constituencies,” the prime minister’s political secretary, Azman Abidin, told AFP.

“Wan Azizah herself is an MP serving in a federal territory so there shouldn’t be any problem for her to chair such a meeting. But the claim on the poster is false because the meeting was not made through any government agencies or departments.”

Azman said that Anwar had not appointed his wife to any position in the PMD and had no plans to do so.

The information department also rejected the false claim, saying: “The political secretary to the prime minister has denied a rumour claiming Wan Azizah’s appointment at the PMD”. - FMT