Auditor’s 1MDB documents classification a humiliation for Parliament, says DAP

DAP's Lim Kit Siang has slammed the move to classified supporting documents in the auditor-general's probe into 1MDB. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Seth Akmal, March 6, 2016.Once tabled to Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC), supporting documents from the Auditor-General's final report on 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) become public documents and should not be under the Official Secrets Act (OSA), DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang says.

This was because PAC was a committee of Parliament, and classifying the final audit report on 1MDB was "an insult and humiliation of not only PAC but of the legislature and all MPs in the House," he said.

Lim said he was "very disappointed" with the statement by former PAC chairman Datuk Nur Jazlan Mohamed who yesterday said that only the accompanying documents to the auditor's 1MDB report would be under OSA.

"This is completely unacceptable. The supporting documents from the auditor-general tabled in PAC have become parliamentary documents and the OSA classification had ceased to exist, otherwise this makes a complete mockery of the assurance by the prime minister that the auditor-general and PAC investigations will be a 'tell all' investigations that leaves no stone unturned," Lim said in a statement.

The Gelang Patah MP questioned if the government was suggesting that the auditor-general's supporting documents on 1MDB be denied to all 222 parliamentarians.

"The prime minister should announce without any ado that he has nothing to hide and that he has no objection whatsoever for the auditor-general’s both reports, the interim and the final audit report, to be tabled in Parliament by PAC without any classification under OSA."

Lim, who is still serving out his six-month suspension from Parliament and will miss the first sitting of the year which begins tomorrow, also repeated his call for a royal commission of inquiry into Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's "twin mega scandals" – allegations implication him in 1MDB's massive debts and the RM2.6 billion donation he received in his personal bank accounts.

"My only wish is that the Royal Address by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong opening Parliament on Monday will announce the establishment of a credible royal commission of inquiry into Najib’s twin mega scandals – which is also the wish of the overwhelming majority of Malaysians who want his twin mega scandals to cease to haunt and hound the nation, as in the past year." – March 6, 2016.