PKR Sarawak leader contradicts Mahathir
He was responding to Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s statement that the government cannot take action against Taib as there have been no formal complaints against him to date.
(MMO) – Baram PKR chairman Roland Engan asserted today that he filed a recent formal complaint against Sarawak Governor Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud for alleged corruption and power abuse while still chief minister.
He said the report was lodged at the Miri office of the MACC on June 6, a week after he lodged a similar report against Taib with the Miri police on May 29.
“As we are concerned, we have lodged the report to MACC at Miri office. Whether our report has reached the MACC headquarters or not, it is the internal matter of MACC,” he said.
He was responding to Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s statement that the government cannot take action against Taib as there have been no formal complaints against him to date.
Engan said the prime minister might have been ill-advised by the state MACC that no reports had been lodged against Taib.
Lawyer Abun Sui Anyit, who was one of the PKR supporters accompanying Engan to the MACC office, said he did not want to speculate on what had happened to the report.
“I will advise him to submit a copy of his report to MACC headquarters so that they will know that a report had been lodged against Taib,” he said, adding that the report was based on documents and a series of news articles published by UK-based whistle-power Sarawak Report and Swiss-based Bruno Manser Fund.
He said Sarawak Report editor Clare Rewcastle Brown and BMF executive director Lukas Strauman were willing to be witnesses if they were called by MACC to give evidence.
Meanwhile, Sarawak Pakatan Harapan (PH) chairman Chong Chieng Jen said he had also lodged a report against Taib.
“(It was a) long ago already,” he said, unable to recall when he lodged the report.
In March 2011, Movement for Change, Sarawak (MoCS) leader Francis Siah had also lodged a police report against Taib for alleged corruption, money laundering and abuse of power.
Yesterday, Dr Mahathir was quoted as telling Malaysians in Jakarta that the authorities had not taken any action against Taib as there were no formal complaints lodged against him.
The prime minister, who is on an official visit to Indonesia, had said that if the people of Sarawak wished the PH federal government to take action, they could lodge official complaint.
“Up to this moment there has been a lot of talk but no proper yet,” he was quoted by The Star daily as saying.
