DAIM ZAINUDDIN FINALLY HAULED BACK INTO THE SPOTLIGHT – WAS HE & MAHATHIR PUTTING ON EVERYONE? – KIT SIANG SHOCKED BY JOMO’S BOMBSHELL – ‘CEP NEVER PRODUCED A REPORT’ – IT WAS A SECRETARIAT UNDER DAIM THAT DID IT – TIME FOR ANWAR TO DECLASSIFY & PUBLISH IT SO THE COUNTRY KNOWS WHAT THE DUO HAVE BEEN UP TO & PERHAPS TRIED TO SUPPRESS FOR POLITICAL REASONS
Lim Kit Siang is shocked that the Council of Eminent Persons (CEP), formed under the Pakatan Harapan government, never produced a report.
He was responding to former CEP member Jomo Kwame Sundaram’s revelation that a secretariat under former finance minister Daim Zainuddin, and not the council, had produced a report.
The DAP veteran called for the CEP secretariat’s report and the findings of the Institutional Reform Committee (IRC) to be tabled as a White Paper before Parliament adjourned on April 4.
He also wanted an explanation from Daim and asked if the latter “agreed that the report of the CEP secretariat and IRC should be made public”.
“When Dr Mahathir Mohamad was prime minister a second time, I had urged him to make the CEP report public,” he added in a statement.
Lim also recalled that Daim had called on the government to make the CEP’s recommendations available to the public.
He added that the former finance minister and close associate of Mahathir had also stated that the CEP interviewed more than 300 individuals, including bankers, businesspersons, civil servants, civil society members and union officials and that those interviewed had revealed a culture of turning a blind eye towards corruption.
In March 2019, Mahathir appealed for more time before revealing the contents of the report, which was classified under the Official Secrets Act (OSA), because it concerned matters still being negotiated.
“I don’t know what we have not revealed, when we reveal everything, but there are some things that are still in negotiations.
“We cannot reveal what we are negotiating until a decision is made,” he had said.
Following this, PKR president Anwar Ibrahim had asked all parties to give Mahathir space to resolve some of the recommendations.
He said although, in principle, Harapan wanted the CEP report to be published, there were some recommendations which could be implemented that needed to be identified so that they could be explained to the people.
However, the Harapan government collapsed in February 2020.
The members of the IRC included former Bar Council president Ambiga Sreenevasan, retired Court of Appeal judges KC Vohrah and Mah Weng Kwai, National Patriots Association president Mohamed Arshad Raji, and constitutional law expert Shad Saleem Faruqi. – MKINI
CEP never produced a report, says Jomo
The economist said he had tried to push for reforms, but to no avail, while serving on the Council of Eminent Persons formed by Dr Mahathir Mohamad in 2018.
PETALING JAYA: The Council of Eminent Persons formed in 2018 never produced a report, economist Jomo Kwame Sundaram said today.
“There is no such report, we never collaborated on such a report,” he said at a talk organised by the Oxford and Cambridge Society of Malaysia.
“A report was prepared by the secretariat under former finance minister Daim Zainuddin. But there was no report on the entire CEP,” he said.
Reforms ignored
Jomo also said that during his time in the CEP, he had tried to push for reforms, especially on the goods and services tax (GST).
“Instead of abolishing GST, I suggested an integrated tax authority, rather than a segmented one. The head of customs was very open to these suggested reforms.
“Unfortunately, the (finance) minister at that time and perhaps the prime minister never considered these reforms, to my knowledge. And so, there were no discussions on this,” he said.
On healthcare
Jomo said he had also pushed for reforms to improve health financing but he did not see any commitment to increase funds for healthcare by the leadership.
“I was heartened last year when the health minister then, Khairy Jamaluddin, wanted to increase government spending on health to 5%, instead of PH’s promised 4%.
“As we know nothing happened. It was not reflected in the budget before Parliament was dissolved last November,” he said.
EPF made a political football
Asked about the clamour by certain groups for targeted withdrawals from the Employees’ Provident Fund, Jomo said EPF has become a political football.
“The Umno leadership and others have basically been pushing very hard for some years now, to allow people to take out as much money as possible from EPF.
“I feel that old people would have very little choice but to continue to work as long as they can (if their EPF savings are depleted).
“It may not necessarily be a bad thing for us to have a longer working life, but considering the poor health that everyone appears to be in, I am really concerned,” he added. FMT
MKINI / FREE MALAYSIA TODAY
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