1MDB: Pua tears minister’s ‘fake front’ to shreds

DAP’s Tony Pua says Deputy Finance Minister is doing the “worst possible job defending” the debt-ridden 1MDB.

PETALING JAYA: Not letting up in his bid to pressure 1Malaysia Development Berhad to open its books to the Auditor-General and to testify to the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee, Tony Pua is now going for the jugular by accusing Ahmad Maslan of putting up a fake front in his job to defend 1MDB.

The National Publicity Secretary was referring to a recent statement Ahmad made, insisting 1MDB generated profits for four years consecutively and only suffered a negative perception because of the recent police report lodged against it by an Umno leader.

Describing Ahmad as the “worst possible candidate with the least credibility”, the MP for Seputeh also mocked his statement saying, “the Deputy Finance Minister is just putting up a fake front to hide the real truths behind the RM42 billion 1MDB scandal.”

Saying Ahmad’s earlier denial, and subsequent retraction of a statement regrading the US$3 billion “letter of support” had caused his reputation to be in “tatters”, Pua added that his most recent remarks showed he was once again “doing the worst possible job defending 1MDB.”

Offering his argument that 1MDB was in deep trouble, Pua said, “It has been repeated umpteen times that 1MDB had made consecutive years of profits from 2010-2013 only as a result of revaluation of assets and properties, and not as a result of any tangible operating profit!”

Saying 1MDB had only recorded “paper profits”, Pua added, “In total over the five years, 1MDB which has taken more than RM42 billion to date, has incurred a staggering cumulative loss of RM4.56 billion.”

Pua also shot down Ahmad’s earlier insistence that 1MDB never missed a debt repayment deadline, saying, “He could not be further from the truth. 1MDB has, not for the first time, missed the deadline to repay an outstanding debt.”

He explained that on November 30, 1MDB asked for an extension on the repayment of a RM2 billion debt, adding, “This sum was part of a debt which was due in November 2013 which has already been restructured and extended multiple times.”

Pua also said, “Worse, the ‘financially strong’ 1MDB is practically insolvent without the injection of new funds because it is now unable to execute the multi-billion ringgit projects it has secured from the Government.”

Pua noted that in November, the company failed to raise RM8.4 billion, saying it was likely “due to the reluctance of investors and financial institutions to lend more money to 1MDB.”