LIM Guan Eng’s lawyers have sent a letter of demand to former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin for asserting that Lim had cancelled the tax exemption given to the Albukhary Foundation during his time as finance minister.  

The DAP national chairman posted on Facebook that his lawyers sent a letter of demand to Muhyiddin to respond to the allegations.  

According to the lawyers’ notice, the letter dated March 15 was written in accordance with the pre-action protocol for defamation.  

The lawyers said if they did not receive a satisfactory reply within seven days from issuance of the letter, they would file a Writ of Summons. 

This, they said, was to seek appropriate remedies against Muhyiddin without further notice to him.  

The lawyers said Lim will also be seeking an injunction to prevent Muhyiddin from making any defamatory statements and seeking punitive, aggravated and exemplary damages and costs.  

Last week, Muhyiddin was charged with two counts of money laundering, where he was alleged to have received RM195 million from Bukhary Equity, which was deposited into Bersatu’s CIMB account. Bukhary Equity is linked to Albukhary Foundation.  

Muhyiddin had mentioned an appeal against a cancellation of the tax exemption granted to Albukhary Foundation during his questioning by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.  

He said the tax exemption was called off by the then finance minister Lim after Pakatan Harapan (PH) came to power in 2018.  

He added that Syed Mokhtar had appealed to him to lift the cancellation after the PH government fell and Muhyiddin became prime minister.  

Lim said that during his tenure as finance minister, he did not issue any specific instruction to cancel the tax exemption that had been approved by the Barisan Nasional government.     

“Clearly, this baseless slander by Muhyiddin has malicious intent to play on sentiments to divert the people’s attention from the four charges of abuse of power and two charges of money laundering involving RM232.5 million that he is facing.  

“It is very easy to inflame or incite the feelings of people by accusing me of deliberately cancelling the tax exemption given to an Islamic welfare organisation.”  

Lim said he had already challenged Muhyiddin to show the letter that proved he issued an order to cancel the tax exemption.   

“I am sure that Muhyiddin is unable to show the letter because it did not exist at all and was simply a fabrication of his.” 

The lawyers stated the allegations made by Muhyiddin were false and malicious. 

In their letter, the lawyers said Muhyiddin’s statements were calculated to destroy Lim’s image as a politician and former finance minister. – March 15, 2023.