Leven Woon| March 25, 2014
Free Malaysia Today
Opposition leaders demand a Parliamentary Select Committee to investigate MH370 disappearance.
KUALA LUMPUR: Pakatan Rakyat leaders today made repeated calls to Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to be forthcoming with the details over his statement last night on the missing MH370.
DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang and PAS’ Pokok Sena MP Mahfuz Omar were adamant that the parliament should best deal with MH370 crisis by setting up a bipartisan select committee (PSC).
They made the requests before and after Najib’s visit to Parliament today.
Najib was in the House today to table a motion of condolence to the passengers and crew of MH370, and it was followed by a debate session.
Mahfuz said Najib has not provided any new information in his speech to the House, hence formation of a PSC was necessary.
“The BN’s Backbencher Club chief (Shahrir Samad) has agreed to our idea of setting up a PSC to look into MH370 issue, so now we should just work towards that,” he told FMT.
Yesterday, Najib announced that flight MH370, carrying 239 people on board, had “ended its flight” in the southern part of the Indian Ocean.
Najib said based on the new analysis, it was concluded that MH370 flew along the southern corridor and that its last position was in the middle of the Indian Ocean, west of Perth.
In reply to that, Lim said Najib’s remarks yesterday has added more questions.
“There has been no concrete evidence or any piece of wreckage, only satellite image suspected from the plane. For a lot of people it is not a closure
“The government wanted a closure, but this is a closure without a closure,” he told a joint Pakatan press conference today, before Najib’s arrival.
Hishammuddin misled the House
Lim said he felt outraged because Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein who was fielding questions in the House hours before Najib made the announcement at 10pm had deceived the House on the status of the search operations.
“It appeared to us that he already knew what was going on but he told Parliament that search and rescue operations are still going on. It is clearly a lie.
“I can understand that he cannot disclose what is going to be announced by the PM but he should not have misled the House,” he said.
The Gelang Patah MP repeated this during the debate of the motion of condolence in the House later.
Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim said Pakatan would take Najib’s announcement on its face value, but they were cautious as it was not conclusive yet.
“There are questions that are left unanswered, we are saying, do not (stop) sharing new information or discussion with other authorities,” he said.
Meanwhile, Minister in the Prime Minister Department Shahidan Kassim said besides PSC, the government has also received requests to setup a royal commission of inquiry on MH 370.
He said the government would study all options.