As BN neutralises fraud, people are made to pay for its folly

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This article was published in TheAntDaily.com on 20/1/2014

As expected, another former leader of a Barisan Nasional (BN) component party has been acquitted of charges of cheating, corruption and power abuse in the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal.

It was either one acquittal after another or cases were not taken to the prosecution stage because of lack of evidence. What happened to the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC), Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and the police? Are they really carrying out their responsibilities?

The nation has lost billions of ringgit in public funds because of such fraud and until today no real culprits, or should we say big fish, were brought to justice and convicted accordingly. In fact, one of the major players of the PKFZ scandal was not even charged and was rewarded with a government posting in another country.

Only a few of those involved were charged and they are mostly low-ranking officials. How could these low-ranking officials on their own conspire to commit frauds of billions of ringgit? From where did they derive the authority to lay their hands on such huge sums of money?

It is clear that they were mere scapegoats. They got instructions from the top. They were delivery or dispatch boys in this scandal. The roles and responsibilities they played showed that they could not have been the mastermind of the scandal.

What concrete reasons could the AGC, MACC and the police give over their failure in solving such crimes, especially in bringing the big fish to book? Why did they fail to secure solid evidence to nail those who stole from our nation’s coffers? Did the prosecution and enforcement teams carry out their responsibilities properly, efficiently and with integrity?

The people are fed up and frustrated with this sad state of affairs. The prime minister’s pledge to combat corruption and to put things in order has gone down the drain.

The worst part is that, instead of clamping down on corruption, power abuse and mismanagement in its administration, the BN government has frequently drummed up racial and religious sentiments to divert the people’s attention from the real issues.

After suffering losses because of its fraudulent acts, the BN government then decided to channel the burden to the people by withdrawing subsidies for many items essential to the public. This, coupled with continuous price hikes, is causing the rising inflation right now.

Is this the way to run the country? Even the coalition’s members of parliament are not serious at all in parliamentary sittings. These BN MPs are only interested in dwelling on unwarranted issues and making discriminatory and even vulgar statements. Their attitude and behaviour show that they are not productive at all and have failed in their role as policy makers.

These BN leaders are putting their self-interests before the people’s and are using their positions to enrich themselves and their cronies. Then they try to cover up their wrongdoings by harping on racial and religious issues, and inciting hatred, disunity and violence in order to divert attention.

Questions to the AGC, MACC and the police again! Who are you all actually working for? For the BN and Umno leaders or for our nation? All your actions have clearly shown that you are serving the interests of the ruling elite rather than the people and the nation.

If the AGC, MACC and the police are really serving our nation so well, how come corruption, power abuse and mismanagement have become so rampant while crime is on the rise? The people have now resorted to hiring private security firms to look after their neighbourhoods, families and properties. Even the private sector too has made it a point to hire private investigators to probe fraudulent activities within their companies instead of getting the MACC or police to carry out such tasks.

The people are reluctant to seek redress from the authorities because they know that these agencies are mere political tools of the ruling party.

So, this is how BN neutralised fraud on its part. As our nation moves towards bankruptcy, the people are struggling to cope with price hikes, subsidy cuts and inflation. Should we be grateful to this government then?

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