A ONCE-STAUNCH supporter of Umno believes abuses in 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) could have been stemmed much earlier had he and other Malays like him spoke up against it when the issue first erupted in 2013.

Yaakob Osman, who joined Bersatu last year, said the opposition was already highlighting the abuses in 1MDB in 2011 and 2012, but many, including himself, turned a deaf ear to the issues raised.

“If we had opened our eyes and realised the issues surrounding 1MDB, things would not be as bad as it is now,” the Penang Bersatu leader told a crowd of about 200 at the 1MDB ceramah “Save Malaysia, end kleptocracy” in Penaga, Penang, last night.

Yaakob, who took the stage alongside DAP’s Tony Pua, the very man he had vilified previously for harping on the 1MDB issue, admitted he felt awkward speaking in front of the Petaling Jaya Utara MP and on a rostrum adorned with the DAP flag.

“But what can we do? We have to do it. The country is in a bad situation. We cannot be on that side any more,” he said, referring to his old party.

“Because we had failed to listen to them, this problem has worsened. Today, I want to redeem my mistake,” the Penang Bersatu information chief told the crowd at a community centre.

Yaakob said he, too, used to slam the opposition, namely Pua and Pandan MP Rafizi Ramli of PKR, whenever they spoke about the 1MDB scandal.

“We would say that it is the job of the opposition – to oppose (the administration). I had said that, too, in the past, ‘Rafizi and Pua oppose because that is their job’.”

Yaakob then touched on the US Department of Justice’s (DoJ) civil suits to recover assets worth billions of ringgit allegedly bought with money stolen from 1MDB, in what was described to be the largest kleptocracy case in US history.

He refuted claims that the civil suits were “foreign intervention” into Malaysia’s domestic affairs, saying that authorities here, including Bank Negara and the Public Accounts Committee in Parliament, had revealed that billions of 1MDB funds could not be traced.

“They claimed that 1MDB money were not lost. That is not right. The money went around the world before being channelled back to Malaysia and into the account of Malaysian Official 1 (MO1).”

MO1 was previously confirmed by Minister Abdul Rahman Dahlan to be Prime Minister Najib Razak, who was 1MDB’s advisory board chairman.

Yaakob said he and many other Malay professionals in Kuala Lumpur had thought of how they could correct the situation and fix what was broken in the country because of the nearly RM50 billion debts incurred by 1MDB.

He said what the people had always wanted was a probe into the scandal to determine whether there were any wrongdoing.

“If there are wrongdoings, then penalise. If there is no wrongdoing, then it is fine. 

“That is the sovereignty of the law,” he said, adding that this was not the case in Malaysia, where “every branch of the law had been suppressed”.

Attorney-General Mohamed Apandi Ali had cleared Najib of any wrongdoing in the IMDB case.

Yaakob said to make improvements to the federal administration, Bersatu would suggest a two-term limit to the prime minister’s post, and all top civil servants like the inspector-general of police, attorney-general and commissioner of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission be appointed by the Senate and not the prime minister.

“This is so that they will be held accountable to Parliament, and not to the prime minister.

“If the PM commits wrongdoing, then they can take action accordingly. Now, they can do nothing.”

Yaakob also reminded the audience – who were mostly Malays – not to think of Umno as the only party that could protect Malay interests and rights.

He said instead of fighting to protect all Malays, Umno seemed to be more concerned with protecting one individual today.

“Since the start of the 1MDB issue, none of Umno’s three million members could remove that one person. And because the three million can’t do it, I have to stand here with Pua. 

“But it is too late to change Umno, even by removing Najib, because Umno is completely corrupt,” he said.

“I hope you will all go home and think about this 1MDB scandal and the figures (of the money allegedly stolen).

“Don’t give them a chance any more. Don’t let one person determine our future.”

The ceramah in Penang was the first event in Pakatan Harapan’s nationwide roadshow to explain the complex 1MDB scandal to rural folk. – July 7, 2017.