Najib: Pakatan bailing out Tabung Haji after destroying it

PETALING JAYA: The whole fiasco involving Tabung Haji (TH) is meant to hide the Pakatan Harapan government's mismanagement of the Muslim pilgrimage fund, says Datuk Seri Najib Razak, who claims that it is Pakatan that destroyed the fund.

The Pekan MP said if one analysed the issue, one would conclude that Pakatan had destroyed TH.

He said it was a perplexing turn of events to see TH's seemingly healthy accounts turn into a deficit of RM4.1bil and requiring a bailout of RM17.8bil.

The former premier said the previous Barisan Nasional government had been paying high hibah (dividend) rates for several years and never had to bail out the fund.

"TH's financial report in 2017, which was approved by the Auditor-General, showed that it has more assets than liabilities.

"Suddenly, when PH took over (the government), they hired a private audit firm, which concluded that TH suffered a RM4.1bil deficit at the end of 2017," he said in a Facebook post on Friday (April 12).

"PH even alleged that Barisan had paid extra hibah for the past few years, to show how "ruthless" Barisan was.

"At the end of 2018, the audit firm reported that TH's deficit had reach RM10.9bil.

"We were even more surprised when the current government said TH needed a RM17.8bil bailout after the fund sold its assets.

"PH supporters then praised the government for approving the bailout. How kind and attentive the government must be.

"However, the supporters never asked the basic question of the need for such a big bailout when the deficit is only RM4.1bil at the end of 2017," Najib said.

The Pekan MP said the conclusion therefore was that Pakatan had destroyed TH.

"After destroying it, the government then needed to bail out TH.

"The government is getting praised for supposedly saving TH after destroying it in the first place," he said.

Najib said similar things are occurring in Felda and he would explain it further soon.