Phang got petty and personal

Since our revelation of MACC "Adviser", Tan Sri Robert Phang involvement in an attempt to bribe a Ministry's KSU here, he claims ignorance in The Malay Mail yesterday.

He said he will be reading this blog if The Malay Mail could e-mail link to this blog. Don't see why anyone should, because he has his own blog here. He should know how to read Rocky Bru's blog and get the link back to this blog.

Hope he will read this posting too. There is more to be told of this MACC officio that misrepresented himself as Adviser and Commissioner.

Phang began to take his personal fight against Tan Sri Gani Patail to national prominence in his November 30th 2010 press release. The Sun report by Karen Arukesamy below:

Phang wants A-G to clear the air

KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 30, 2010): Attorney-General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail should clear the air once and for all on the cases investigated by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) which escaped prosecution.

Social Care Foundation chairman Tan Sri Robert Phang said today Abdul Gani should explain and clarify to the people the reasons some of the cases submitted to the A-G’s Chambers were not prosecuted or resulted in acquittals without the defence being called.

"The A-G must dispel all doubts to uphold the dignity of his office and clear the public perception on MACC, which has been accused of selective prosecution," he told a press conference at a hotel here.

"Of late, MACC has been criticised over its handling of several high-profile cases, and many have said that its performance is not up to the mark."

He said the cases the MACC has been accused of selective prosecution included:

• the failure to prosecute former Selangor mentri besar Datuk Seri Dr Khir Toyo over his ownership of a mansion reportedly valued at RM24 million whereas several Pakatan Rakyat assemblymen in Selangor were subjected to investigations over alleged abuse of allocations amounting to only RM2,400 like the Teoh Beng Hock case;

• the prosecution of Tourism director-general Datuk Mirza Thaiyab whereas others responsible were not held accountable;

• the prosecution of certain people in the multi-billion ringgit Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal whereas the forensic audit report by PricewaterhouseCoopers had named many other personalities, including former transport minister Tan Sri Chan Kong Choy; and

• no decision to act against former inspector-general of police Tan Sri Musa Hassan and Abdul Gani, after former Kuala Lumpur CID chief Datuk Mat Zain Ibrahim published letters accusing these two officials of manipulating and tampering with evidence in Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim's "black eye Incident".
  

"The MACC does its best to investigate and gather evidence before submitting a case to the A-G’s Chambers for a decision to prosecute. That is the role of the MACC," Phang, who also sits on the MACC Consultation and Corruption Prevention Panel, said.

"Malaysians have every right to judge and criticise MACC’s performance but that must be done fairly. They cannot blame or hold MACC responsible for failing to decide on prosecution because that is the power and jurisdiction of the A-G’s Chambers."

Phang, who said he is not defending MACC or speaking as an advisory panel member, pointed out that MACC does not have the power to prosecute.

"Sometimes the A-G would not decide to prosecute a case because of lack of evidence, so the case would be sent back to MACC to continue with the investigation," he said.

Urging the people to encourage and support MACC in its efforts to eradicate corruption, Phang said MACC’s success rate in convictions should be acknowledged and highlighted.

"If there is lack of evidence, then the A-G must not try to bulldoze its way and order a case to be prosecuted because when a case is lost in court, the public is always quick to blame the MACC, not the A-G," he said.

Phang also urged Abdul Gani to clarify an allegation posted on the Malaysia Today blog, saying that Abdul Gani is currently performing the haj with someone associated with a public figure that has been tried in court.

"Another case that has caught public attention involves lawyer Rosli Dahlan. The alternative media has created the perception that Rosli has been victimised as a result of his professional role in pursuing civil and criminal action against former Malaysia Airlines chairman Tan Sri Tajudin Ramli," he said.

Phang said he has received two letters from Rosli, asking MACC to withdraw a charge that it had preferred against him and learnt that MACC had recommended to the A-G that it would like the case to be withdrawn.

"However, till today, the A-G has not responded," he said.

"I hope the public will understand that in matters relating to prosecution of an offence, Article 145(3) of the Federal Constitution vests the A-G with the discretion to institute, conduct or discontinue any proceedings.

"As such, MACC does not have the power to withdraw the charge against Rosli unless the A-G agrees to do so."

Phang also called on Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz not to delay the cabinet’s investigation on allegations against Abdul Gani, and to ensure transparency in the matter.

The detailed press release is available on his blog here.


From this report, Phang was clearly getting personal when he picked on such petty issue as Gani's Haj trip with Shahidan Shafie.

This issue took a life of it's own and Gani had to eventually face a panel of 30 Committee members of MACC.

When Tan Sri Ramon Navaratnam said he was satisfied, Phang did not secede. He insisted on pounding this personal issue. However, he had a real Adviser on his side as in Prof Ishak who seem to express some reservation.

Why the big fuzz over Gani being seen in Mekah with someone during Haj?

If one goggle, one will find a report claiming Shahidan as a proxy of former MAS Chairman, Tan Sri Tajuddin Ramli.

Since there is a past police report, later an ACA report and recently MACC report against Tajuddin for allegations of undetailed MAS loss of RM8 billion and MAS subsidiary MAS Cargo loss, Shahidan's trip is seen as in conflict of interest.

Shahidan's name was featured in Malaysia Today's 8-series feature, The Untold MAS Story from July 4th till July 21st 2009. The claim was that Shahidan was the go-between man for Tajuddin and Gani.

Just like friendship between both recently acquited former CID Chief Dato Ramli Yusof and lawyer Rosli Dahlan, Gani and Shahidan are friends that go way back.

My source claim that Shahidan was formerly with the police force and later took up law and practised. He neither advise nor represent Tajuddin, formally or informally. And he never worked with Tajuddin.

The claim that the friendship gave rise to conflict of interest is far fetch. Legally, any conflict of interest that can arise from marriage is limited parent-children, spousal and inter-sibling relationships.

How can it be for Shahidan who happen to be cousin to Dato Bistamam Ramli's wife, Datin Rizana? Bistamam is younger brother of Tajuddin.

There is no legal conflict of interest to arise from cousin relationship and what more with two more layers before reaching Tajuddin.

If there is such conflict, Phang has to show proof and not merely speculate. He is not a blogger or analyst making assumptions for an analysis or Singapore's Wikileak-ed Special Branch gathering information.

To make an issue of the Haj trip, Phang is being petty and personal.

Never mind the fact that maybe two or more out of the 30 present during Gani's explanatory session is not quite happy. If Ramon express satisfaction and the decision making is not consensus base, it is assumed the majority cleared him.

Ramon is a man with impeccable integrity and brevity to call a spade a spade. There are times Ramon's remark do touch the nerve of this blogger. But as a former Government servant, he is more diplomatic and refined than a runner boy between a politician and a Chinese taiko.

So where is the objectivity of those, who supported Phang blindly or out of vengence, villifying Ramon now but praised Ramon when he was critical towards Government?

There is another twist to this Haj accusation which Phang held back from the public. Not only was Gani seen with Shahidan in Mekah, Gani was seen with Zulhisham Ayub.

Zulhisham Ayub is a former Manager in Celcom. If Shahidan is claimed as close with Tajuddin, Zulhisham hated Tajuddin. He left Celcom and started the advertising firm, Pakar Media with one Mirza Tariq.

Mirza Tariq is the brother of Dato Mirza Thaiyib, the Tourism Director General charged in court for corruption by Gani for dental work.

The dentist was Dr Kamsiah, former wife of Zulhisham and now wife of recent Dato Prof Din Merican. Kamsiah was also a college friend of former Tourism Minister, Dato Azalina Mohd Said.

Many believed Mirza was fixed and he was saved by a fraudulent receipt presented in court.

How will Phang treat the encounter?

Will he accuse Gani as being in collusion with Zulhisham to help lose MACC the case against Mirza Thaiyib? But Phang was defending Mirza Thaiyib.

Will he take the position to accuse Gani as in collusion to charge Mirza Thaiyib again? It was the fell out between Zulhisham and his then wife dentist Dr Kamsiah that led to Mirza Thaiyib being charged.

Coming back to the Haj story, Phang never and will never be able to experience Mekah. He should just shut-up.

There are millions of Muslims going to Haj and Malaysia sent about 24,000 Muslims for pilgrimmage annually. One is bound to share facility with many acquintances, friends, families and even enemies.

Talking about enemny, Azmin Ali shared tent with Dr Khir Toyo in the last pilgrimmage season.

In Mekah with millions of people from all over the world within a small space, anything could happen and anyone could bump to anybody.


Now, one wonder how Phang could secure the information of Gani going to Haj with Shahidan.

One source would likely be Tabung Haji who has the list of all pilgrims. Another could be the Airline i.e. MAS. Rosli Dahlan is lawyer for MAS in their case against Tajuddin.

Gani's pilgrimmage trip is an open secret. One can bet that the legal community has knowledge of Gani's one month disappearance for Haj.

Somebody must have tipped off someone with access to information at MAS or Tabung Haji. Could it be Rosli Dahlan?

Rosli Dahlan takes the MAS cases against Tajuddin very personal since he believe the acquited cases against Ramli Yusof and himself was a conspiracy set-up by the likes of Tajuddin, Gani and Tan Sri Musa Hasan.

Another possibility is someone saw Gani and Shahidan together in Mekah. That someone should have known that Gani was seen with Zulhisham too. Then no one would have wrongly tipped Phang.

Phang's first statement against MACC could not help one feel hopeless to a sense of anarchy developing in this country.

All the loud talk by a member of MACC's committee against MACC, Police and Attorney General office is based on perception created by the writings on Malaysia Today and Din Merican's blog.

He is making a series of accusations and allegations based on perception orchestrated by the wild stories of Raja Petra and Din Merican.

Phang's list of concern seemed long but the focus is on Tajuddin and MAS. There will be some revelation that will embarass them. All in due time.

The frustrating part of this pretensious attempt to clean-up the corruption is that it is based on the writing of two person who believed the Pusrawi medical report of Saiful Bahari as in existent.

Spinning from a non-existent report, one of the person revealed a statutory declaration from the doctor. Using these fraudulent reports, they are dead set convinced and intent to convince all Malaysians to believe Anwar did not sodomise Saiful.

Both of them still believe that Rosmah killed Altantunya despite pictures of Rosmah at an orphanage home function at that very night widely available on the Internet. The subjects one "third party" statutory declaration claim to see the murder had denied and made statutory declarations (still not reversed unlike Bala's.)

Where is the credibility of the sources used by Phang to make allegations? His sources are a fugitive running away from the law and an economic "professor" dabbling in the intrigue of crooked politics and business he is unaccustomed.

There can only be one source of information for them to write on. Keep it for later.

Hmmm ... by the look of things, Phang should stop claiming himself as Community leader, philantropist, MACC Adviser or Commissioner. He is behaving like a cybertrooper, hardly a blogger.

There is still another link to look. During Phang's heydays in Sabah time with Tan Sri Wee Boon Ping and Dato Harris Salleh, there is one man he come to be acquinted with.

That is Ramli Yusoff, the then Sabah CID. He was the Sabah Deepthroat, the police insider that leaked information to Malaysia Today and most of the story is directed towards Musa Hasan.

Rosli Dahalan is his friend, lawyer and fellow plaintiff.

Together with recently noisy, former Kuala Lumpur CID Dato Md Zin IBrahim, they are all with Raja Petra and Din Merican pitching for Anwar Ibrahim.

Phang seems to be playing it from both end of MCA/SUPP and DAP. Dua alam ...

* Edited 8:00 am Jan 20th 2011