LIM Guan Eng has cast doubt over whether PAS members had asked “the right questions” on the multi-billion-ringgit 1Malaysia Development Berhad scandal in its roundtable meeting with the state investor.

The DAP secretary-general, in joining the growing chorus questioning PAS’ “satisfaction” with the explanation given by 1MDB president Arul Kanda Kandasamy on the fund’s debts and rationalisation exercise, said the Islamic party should explain how it found the responses satisfactory.

“Did they understand what Arul Kanda said? There are many questions raised that are still unanswered.

“Is PAS satisfied that Malaysia has to pay so much money and got nothing, and that the debt repayment to IPIC (International Petroleum Investment Company) is late?

“Did they ask if we are ever going to get back our money?” he said in a press conference at Komtar today.

It was reported that Arul Kanda spent two hours explaining 1MDB-related matters to 30 PAS central committee members, led by deputy president Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man, and invitees, including former Selangor menteri besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim.

The questions targeting PAS and, indirectly, 1MDB, come as the state investor received another extension to repay RM2.6 billion to IPIC.

1MDB had passed the five-day grace period granted by IPIC after it missed the original deadline to pay the Abu Dhabi sovereign fund on July 31.

The sum owed is the first of two payments, amounting to US$1.2 billion, due to IPIC before the end of the year, according to the terms of a private arbitration carried out in London in April.

Lim asked whether PAS had posed 1MDB the right questions and received satisfactory replies.

“Did they ask how the money was spent? What about the United States Department of Justice suits, the pink diamond, and the jewellery for Miranda Kerr?”

He was referring to the DoJ civil suits filed in the US last year and this year to seize luxury assets worth billions of dollars, including a RM117 rare pink diamond set in a necklace, and diamond jewellery that businessman Low Taek Jho had bought for Kerr, an Australian supermodel, using money allegedly stolen from 1MDB.

Lim said it might have been better if people like Tony Pua, DAP’s Petaling Jaya Utara MP, who has been scrutinising 1MDB over the last few years, had attended the roundtable meeting.

The Penang chief minister also brought up the 94.7ha plot of land that 1MDB had bought in Air Itam without 100% ownership.

1MDB reportedly bought the land in Penang years ago, at RM1.38 billion, for housing projects announced in the run-up to the 2013 general election.

“Did they ask why 1MDB bought land without getting 100% ownership?” said Lim.

Due to the scandal surrounding the fund, the Penang government froze the property in 2015, preventing the transaction of the land, and instructed the Land Office to go after 1MDB and demand an explanation.

PAS organ HarakahDaily reported that the party believed a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the 1MDB scandal, followed by punitive action against the wrongdoers, was the only way to restore public confidence in the government.

The PAS mouthpiece said the Public Accounts Committee in Parliament was not up to solving the 1MDB problem because it comprised MPs and was invested with only the power to investigate. – August 8, 2017.