{"id":4171,"date":"2013-02-26T17:09:19","date_gmt":"2013-02-26T09:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/?p=4171"},"modified":"2013-02-26T17:09:19","modified_gmt":"2013-02-26T09:09:19","slug":"grave-doubts-over-bn-integrity-pledge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/grave-doubts-over-bn-integrity-pledge\/","title":{"rendered":"Grave doubts over BN Integrity Pledge"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Sepanggar \u2014 Lim Kit Siang poses with youths during his ceramah in Sepanggar, Sabah, January 2013.<\/p><\/div>\n

SEGAMAT, 25 February \u2014 DAP Parliamentary Leader, Lim Kit Siang reasserted his stand on signing the Transparency International (TI) Malaysia Election Integrity Pledge, saying that while signing the pledge would not be problem for him, he wants it to be \u201ca meaningful and not a meaningless exercise\u201d.<\/p>\n

Lim said so in responding in a statement made by Prime Minister Najib Razak in Kuching, asking Pakatan Rakyat leaders to sign the integrity pledge \u201cif they are committed in fighting corruption and abuses of power\u201d.<\/p>\n

Najib, also Barisan Nasional (BN) Chairman, earlier signed the integrity pledge on 20 February \u2014 a gesture DAP National Deputy Chairman, Tan Kok Wai decribed as a \u201csmokescreen\u201d to divert from the actual issues of corruption.<\/p>\n

Hollow promises an insult<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lim, finding Najib\u2019s statement as \u201cthe greatest insult and dishonouring\u201d to those standing for honesty and integrity for so long, further lamented whether the country has reached a point where \u201cthe sins of corruption could just be absolved with a signature\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to Lim, also the Member of Parliament for Ipoh Timur, it is during the last four years of Najib\u2019s prime ministerial tenure that Malaysia had plunged to \u201cthe worst of rankings\u201d in the annual TI Corruption Perception Index (CPI).<\/p>\n

Lim pointed out that \u201cgrave doubts\u201d have risen about the meaningfulness of the Najib\u2019s signing of the integrity pledge, claiming that Najib and party have not been serious in their efforts of combating corruption and power abuse.<\/p>\n

\u201cCan Najib\u2019s signing of the TI Election Integrity Pledge absolve him of all the failures to check corruption and abuses of power in the past four years or his own involvements in corrupt deals and abuses of power?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

Lim also claimed that Najib has violated the integrity pledge at least five times during the Chinese New Year celebrations, citing the lavish expenses on having South Korean superstar Psy to perform in Penang as one of them.<\/p>\n

If Suharto or Marcos signed a pledge, would it matter?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lim took Najib and BN\u2019s case to comparison with former presidents of Indonesia, Suharto and the Philippines\u2019 Ferdinand Marcos\u2019 massive practices of corruption, asking, \u201cIf Suharto or Marcos had signed an Election Integrity Pledge at the height of their power and office, would it enhance or discredit such a pledge?\u201d<\/p>\n

Lim took an extra effort by making a proposal to Najib and Barisan Nasional to attach a 10-point Addendum to the TI Election Integrity Pledge, but to no response.<\/p>\n

Pointing out the proposal at a ceramah in Kuching, Lim said the addendum is to ensure a pledge signing that ushers into a \u201cnew era of integrity and good governance rather than being involved in a pure publicity stunt\u201d.<\/p>\n

Najib should declare assets for integrity<\/strong><\/p>\n

Meanwhile the DAP Secretary-General, Lim Guan Eng said Najib\u2019s endorsement of the integrity pledge would only be meaningful if the prime minister and other Barisan Nasional leaders make a step ahead in making a full and complete declaration of their assets.<\/p>\n

The Penang Chief Minister later cited the example of the state Pakatan Rakyat-led government\u2019s exercise of declaring the assets of its Chief Minister and state executive councillors to the public, suggesting that Najib and BN must follow Penang\u2019s lead if they want to proof their integrity.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they cannot even perform this simple exercise then there is no point to sign an Integrity Pledge,\u201d said Lim. \u2014 The Rocket<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SEGAMAT, 25 February \u2014 DAP Parliamentary Leader, Lim Kit Siang reasserted his stand on signing the Transparency International (TI) Malaysia Election Integrity Pledge, saying that while signing the pledge would not be problem for him, he wants it to be \u201ca meaningful and not a meaningless exercise\u201d. Lim said so in responding in a statement […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4172,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[274],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}