FORMER Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak is at it again (and again). He waxed lyrical about his financial administration, while condemning the Pakatan Harapan administration with lies and half-truths.
In latest news published by Free Malaysia Today, Najib sang praises of how well the economy was doing under his administration with only debts of RM687 bil compared to a massive increase to RM1 tril under the Pakatan Harapan (PH) Government.
“Congratulations Pakatan, congratulations Guan Eng, congratulations Abahkau and congratulations Atok,” he jabbed.
In this case, Najib is probably the worst possible Finance Minister Malaysia has ever had because he does not know how to count, or more likely, he believes that the Malaysian voters are so stupid that they will believe his blatant lies.
The explanation for Malaysia’s RM1 tril debt level has been done in great detail. It was “discovered” and tabulated immediately after Pakatan took over from Barisan Nasional (BN). Not even an imbecile would believe that any Government could have increased debt by more than RM300 bil in barely a few weeks.
The truth is, RM1 tril debt was inherited from Najib’s Government. It’s just that he hid it from the public by pretending that the Government debt was only RM687 bil (which was big enough as it is).
All the Pakatan administration did was uncovering all the debts hidden under various pretenses. For example, Najib wrote secret Government letters of guarantee for 1Malaysia Development Board (1MDB) to borrow money which the Malaysian taxpayers are now forced to bear. The 1MDB-related debts alone add up to more than RM40 bil of the total debt.
“Public-private partnership” farce
Najib also carried out many mega projects at inflated value, using “off-balance sheet”. Basically, it means that the Government borrowed money indirectly, via its wholly-owned subsidiaries, to carry out these projects without being reflected in the RM687 bil debt.
The best examples would be the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) projects which have cost more than RM80 bil and were not even approved by the Parliament in the annual Budget sittings.
However, Malaysians today have to pay that debt with interest because these projects were never going to be able to repay its debts on their own.
Worse still, Najib carried out tens of billions of ringgit of projects under the so-called “public-private partnership” initiative, which was essentially a fancy name for highly-priced leasing schemes by the Government from private companies.
These overpriced leasing schemes provided returns of up to 15% per annum to Najib and UMNO’s crony companies. Again, these figures were hidden by the ex-premier from his RM687 bil “official debt” – and Malaysians are still paying for them until today.
What the Pakatan administration did was simply expose Najib’s lies and deceits after taking over, to tell the truth to all Malaysians. We even had the country’s top auditors from Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC) to confirm and verify these numbers.
If Najib, UMNO and Barisan Nasional ever return to “full” power, there is no doubt that they are going to continue to cheat and deceive Malaysians all over again.
It will be the return of the kleptocrats! They will steal from the state coffers and continue to hide their corruption using artificial figures – just like what Najib is doing now.
At the end of the day, it will be Malaysians, especially our youth and children who have to pay for Najib and BN’s misfeasance, their insatiable greed and corruption, and the escalation of national debt in the future. – Jan 29, 2022
Tony Pua is the MP for Damansara.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
