MACC must immediately reopen Dr M's old files - Puad Zarkashi

JOHOR BAHRU - Umno supreme council member Datuk Dr Mohd Puad Zarkashi urged the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to reopen old case files on former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and his children.

The Johor state legislative assembly speaker said that Dr Mahathir often claimed to be clean while cronyism and nepotism took place at the time of his premiership.

"For example, Petronas went through MISC's bailout of Mirzan's ship consortium. Dr Mahathir was the premier at that time. Wasn't that cronyism? "In 1997, Mokhzani Mahathir was the largest shareholder of Pantai Hospital Group. Once again, Dr Mahathir was also the prime minister at that time.

"This group controlled the equipment supply contracts for all government hospitals, including the Fomema concession. "Mokhzani was also the owner of Kencana Group, which received multibillion-ringgit contracts from Petronas," he said in a statement on Facebook on Saturday.

Puad, who is also Rengit assemblyman, said that Dr Mahathir was still the premier in 2002 and, at the same time, played the role of Petronas advisor.

"MACC has to investigate whether there was cronyism until Kencana Petroleum received the treatment of a 'golden child'.

"Dr Mahathir retired in 2003. He was an adviser to Petronas for 12 years. Was Petronas free of cronyism? 22 years and 22 months are protected by the prime minister's post. It is high time MACC opened up old files," he said.