Lim Kit Siang

Arul Kanda’s unprecedented appearance in Sungai Besar a triple admission of the impact of the Colloquium on 1MDB scandal in Sekinchan, the lack and loss of credibility of government explanation on 1MDB scandal as well as 1MDB impact on Saturday’s by-elections

The unprecedented appearance of the 1MDB president and executive director Arul Kanda in Sungai Besar is a triple admission – the impact of the Colloquium on 1MDB scandak in Sekinchan last Saturday which was opened by former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, the lack and loss of credibility of government explanation on the 1MDB global scandal as well as the 1MDB impact on Saturday’s by-elections.

The 1MDB president and executive director’s programme in Sungai Besar showed that Arul Kanda’s job is more a PR one than to really solve the global financial scandal, especially as it is the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak himself who is sitting on top of the mountain of 1MDB debts and problems since the very start of the so-called national sovereign fund some seven years ago.

Why is Arul Kanda acting like “a thief in the night” refusing to comment when asked by the press whether he was campaigning for UMNO/Barisan Nasional in the Sungai Besar by-election, when his job should be to resolve Malaysia’s greatest global financial scandal in the nation’s history?

As 1MDB is a 100% government company, Arul Kanda is finally paid from the taxpayers’ monies and no more than a public servant.

As such, he should owe his loyalty to the 30 million Malaysians and not just to his formal employers – the 1MDB, the Ministry of Finance or the Prime Minister himself.

Can we expect Arul to give the 30 million Malaysians, who are his final employers, a full and unvarnished account of the woes of 1MDB, and how a “strategic” national sovereign fund should end up in such pathetic straits, threatening to drag the country to precedented debts and economic woes and liabilities?

So far, the UMNO/Barisan Nasional government with the full help of Arul Kanda, had been avoiding full accountability for the nation’s first global financial scandal, believing that it can get away with the “greatest heinous crime in Malaysian history but without criminals” – winning a handsome victory not only in the recent Sarawak state general election, but also in the Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar by-elections on Saturday.

If the voters of Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar send a clear and unmistakable message, heard not only nation-wide but all over the world, by rejecting the Umno/BN candidates on Saturday, the Prime Minister and the UMNO/Barisan Nasional Government will get akin to an “electric shock” which will serve as a wake-up call that either they give full and satisfactory accountability for the 1MDB global scandal, or they should expect to be evicted from Putrajaya in the 14th General Election in less than 24 months!