KUANTAN: The proposed Nothing to Hide 2.0 between Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak will not touch the various purported scandals that plagued the premiership of the former during his 22 years in power.
Instead of touching on the Memali murders, the Maminco Sdn Bhd tin disaster, the Bank Negara forex scandal and a multitude of scandals during Dr Mahathir's time as prime minister, it will just touch on the 1Malaysia Development Bhd(1MDB) issue.
According to a posting on the Malaysia Today online portal by blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin, the proposed debate would only focus on the 1MDB issue as the other issues would not be able to topple Najib from his current premiership.
"All those scandals(during Dr Mahathir's premiership) may have cost the nation more than RM100 billion, but the ‘Nothing to Hide 2.0’ debate will not be discussing all those. Instead, they want to discuss just one issue, 1MDB.
"And they need to discuss just this one issue and not all the many other and bigger issues because all those other issues cannot bring Najib down while they hope the 1MDB issue will. Only what can bring Najib down matters and all the rest do not," Petra wrote.
In addition to the incidents involving Memali, Maminco and Bank Negara, Petra also listed other scandals that plagued Dr Mahathir's administration such as: the murder of Jalil Ibrahim, who was sent to Hong Kong to investigate the Bumiputera Malaysia Finance Ltd(BMF) scandal; the Perwaja Steel scandal, Operasi Lalang; the sacking of the Chief Justice (Lord President) and the various judges who Dr Mahathir could not allegedly control; the Petronas Twin Tower that billionaire Tan Sri T. Ananda Krishnan was said to have gotten for free after Petronas was made to buy one tower at double the cost; the Bakun Dam scam; the Petronas bailout of Bank Bumiputra Malaysia Bhd(BBMB); the Petronas bailout of Consortium Perkapalan, the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal, the buy-back of Malaysia Airlines(MAS) at 117% above market price, the Boustead Naval Shipyard scandal, among others.
Petra was commenting on an announcement on Wednesday by Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia(PPBM) Armada chief Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman that a public debate would be held between Dr Mahathir and Najib. Dr Mahathir is PPBM chairman.
"By calling it the ‘Nothing to Hide 2.0’ debate they may not be able to attract as many people as they would if they called it the ‘Jatuhkan Najib 9.0’(Topple Najib 9.0) debate instead, because in essence that is what it is, a ninth attempt to oust Najib since July 2015, Najib has more lives than a cat," said Petra.