PKR tells Cabinet: Make public minutes on NFC meetings

PETALING JAYA- PKR is now demanding the Najib administration discloses all Cabinet meeting minutes from 2006 onwards to determine if minister Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil was directly involved in the decision to award the National Feedlot Centre (NFC) project to her husband’s company.
PKR strategy director Rafizi Ramli said this was because yesterday’s rebuttal by the NFC over the issue had only validated all exposés made so far by the party against the company.
He said NFC executive chairman Datuk Seri Dr Mohamad Salleh Ismail, Shahrizat’s husband, had not denied a single allegation and had merely offered explanations for the many discrepancies involved in the federally-funded RM250 million cattle project.

“He (Mohamad) answered to nine exposures. But none of them, none of them were denials or a rejection of our claims. Everything that he said was merely to explain, give excuses to what we have exposed,” Rafizi told a press conference here, adding PKR is now emboldened to pursue the issue further.
Instead, he said Mohamad had made three major admissions when addressing the issue yesterday — that his company had no experience in the cattle farming industry prior to the project award; that the RM250 million government loan had not been accompanied by a repayment schedule; and that the company had purchased “not one, but two” luxury condominium units at a whopping RM13.8 million in total.
The admissions, said Rafizi, clearly proved there were elements of corruption in the entire NFC project.
“They tried to explain the nitty-gritty details, why the cows had cost so much and so on ... but we want to bring the focus back now to the key issues at hand — accountability, responsibility, conflict of interest and the trust we have in our government in handling taxpayers’ money.
“And the key issue now ... was Shahrizat involved or not?” he continued.
Rafizi said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak must step into the controversy immediately and publicly disclose all Cabinet meeting minutes that involved any discussion related to the NFC and the decision to award the contract, which he said took place between 2006 and 2008.
The project kicked off in 2008.
“If someone has an interest during the discussion on the awarding of a contract, that someone must declare her interest and exclude herself from the decision-making process.
“So, how extensive was Shahrizat’s involvement during the decision-making process? Did she or did she not exclude herself? Is it too difficult to disclose the Cabinet meeting minutes? It would be a good start,” said Rafizi.

-TheMalaysianInsider