Report an indictment of Pakatan, says Umno man

Who to trust: Shahril and Chan question if Malaysians would still trust the Opposition after reading the declassified report.

PETALING JAYA: Pakatan Harapan leaders are still peddling old slogans made in the previous general election despite the declassified report on former attorney general Tan Sri Tommy Thomas’ book showing they had failed in their pledges, says Umno information chief Shahril Hamdan.

“Apparently, they (Pakatan) are more clean, reformist, sincere and more ‘rakyat’. They accused Umno of wanting to win because they want to intervene in court cases,” said Shahril, while questioning whether Malaysians would still believe promises made by the Opposition.

He also questioned whether Malaysians would still believe Pakatan leaders who pledged to jail certain politicians if they managed to win Putrajaya again.

“This is not a struggle for the people, but rather a political struggle for revenge.

“They hate everything to do with Umno and Barisan Nasional and they are inciting the public to hate,” Shahril said in a Facebook post yesterday.

He added that the declassified report on Thomas’ autobiography My Story: Justice in the Wilderness had highlighted irregular appointments of top positions in the country’s judiciary.

He said the report had shown that these appointments involved individuals agreed upon by Thomas and then prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad in a discussion between them.

“The names (involved) differed from the choice of the Judicial Appointments Commission.

“This goes against the law, specifically the Judicial Appointments Act. It was stressed on page 38 of the declassified report that a prime minister does not have any power to appoint a judicial candidate for the courts above,” said Shahril.

He said appointments presented to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong must be names proposed by the Judicial Appointments Commission.

“This is not an issue of questioning the integrity of judges appointed in 2018, and it’s far from questioning the legitimacy of the appointment by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong,” said Shahril.

MCA central committee member Chan Quin Er said that the fact that Thomas had actually written a letter to express his refusal to cooperate with the special task force clearly showed that he understood the situation he was in.

“This report had thrown a wrench into the reformist facade Pakatan has always tried to cultivate in its propaganda,” said Chan when contacted.