Communications and Multimedia Minister Salleh Said Keruak has denied that the anti-fake news law is aimed at silencing debate on the 1MDB.
“But this is not true. There is nothing to stop anyone from debating or talking about 1MDB,” Salleh said in a blog posting this morning in response to critics.
However, he said, the issue is when a person spreads false information as “news” and “facts”.
“For example, we keep hearing ‘news’ that RM42 billion of 1MDB’s money has ‘disappeared’ into thin air when this has been officially explained and proven false.
“The bigger issue here is to deal with the irresponsible spread of such fake ‘news’ and ‘facts’, which applies to many other situations in our lives,” he added.
Salleh pointed out that when a lie is repeated many times, the people believe it to be the truth.
The Communications Minister himself has now confirmed what everyone has suspected, which is that the ‘Fake News’ bill is all about protecting Najib Razak over the 1MDB scandal and all his other corruptions. To silence the critics and cover-up.
The problem is that the world can see that it is all these cover-ups that are the Fake News, as Salleh’s claims and antics become all the more contradictory and ridiculous.
On this occasion he is claiming that ‘Fake News’ providers are saying that RM42 million “disappeared into thin air”. In fact, what people are saying is that the money was traced by MACC investigators from 1MDB’s subsidiary SRC into Najib’s bank account, where amongst other things it was used to pay for a very wasteful and ineffective anti-ageing treatment for his wife.
We know this, because the documents have been leaked and the details corroborated, including the cheque paid to the anti-ageing doctor in that particular case, which was confirmed by his alternative medicine association boss.
Not only that, Salleh’s own Attorney General waved the MACC papers that showed the same money trail in front of cameras at the very press conference Salleh is referring to when he says “this has been officially explained and proven false”.
As the facts pile up world-wide in this 1MDB investigation, amidst asset seizures, court rulings, jail sentences and all the rest. Salleh and Najib are left only bleating ‘Fake News, Fake News’.
It has become a very sad joke at the expense of the dignity of Malaysia.