KANGAR: Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim today called on all quarters across the political divide to work together to ensure the country would not be tainted by large scale corruption and power abuse ever again.
He also urged civil servants to discard the permissiveness mentality and to uphold democratic accountability values to prevent such shameful incident from recurring.
"My duty is to bring changes to this country so that we will no longer be tainted by large scale power abuse and corruption scandals.
"I have travelled to many countries and everywhere I went, I kept being asked about 1MDB (1Malaysia Development Bhd) and how power abuses at such a large scale had taken place in this country.
"This happened because many of us had accepted the permissiveness mentality by being tolerant of corruption albeit for small amount.
"Almost all huge contracts have leakages and commissions being paid... in certain cases the amounts are large," he said in his special address to 1,200 civil servants from federal agencies in Perlis here today.
Present were Menteri Besar Mohd Shukri Ramli and State Secretary Datuk Seri Hasnol Zam Zam Ahmad.
He reminded all parties to work together to save the country despite other differences.
Anwar, who is also the finance minister, told civil servants that he would not carry on the practice of his predecessors in approving projects during working visits to states.
"I wish to inform everyone here not to expect this prime minister to come over and, in order to win over the people, simply announce this project and that project.
"To announce any project, we need to do careful studies and get the approval of the agencies concerned to make it proper.
"Otherwise, we just simply announce projects but nothing is happening. How many hundreds of projects had been announced for Perlis but they have not taken off, especially projects announced during the general election campaign.
"I don't want to continue such practices, I have decided that once they are finalised, only then I will announce them (the projects)," he said.
Regarding projects that had been approved by the previous administration for Perlis, such as the Sanglang Port, Perlis Inland Port and food security, Anwar said the matter would be discussed in the upcoming Northern Corridor Economic Region (NCER) meeting.
"Those are among the projects highlighted by the menteri besar to me.
"We will discuss in detail after we have tabled the (2023) Budget next month," he told reporters after the event.
On another matter, Anwar said he would look into pleas to write off outstanding rental fees for the People's Housing projects.