The DAP secretary-general and Amanah president noted that this year was Malaysia’s second straight drop in Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perception Index (CPI). — Picture by Hari Anggara
KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 28 — The Malaysia Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) vow to address the country’s five-place fall in a global index was hollow as it was part of the reason for the continued decline, Lim Guan Eng and Mohamad Sabu said today.
The DAP secretary-general and Amanah president noted that this year was Malaysia’s second straight drop in Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perception Index (CPI).
Lim and Mohamad said this was in part due to the MACC consistently and persistently allowing itself to be weaponised against opposition politicians, threatening those with investigations that mysteriously end when they switch allegiance to support the ruling parties.
“The MACC has failed to perform its statutory duty to act impartially, independently and professionally in a transparent manner without fear or favour.
“Worse, MACC itself is riddled with abuse of power and corrupt practices where the lawman becomes the outlaw,” they said in a joint statement today.
The two highlighted 17 prominent cases of abuses of power in which the MACC allegedly failed to act, including offers of position from former prime minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to other MPs to support him.
“MACC must come clean and explain why there is still no action on these 17 cases. Failing to do their duty professionally and responsibly, will only cause Malaysia’s CPI rankings to slip down further this year and cause a further drop of investor confidence and Malaysia’s competitiveness,” said the statement.
Malaysia dropped to 62nd spot out of the 180 countries in the CPI 2021 compared to its 57th position in 2020, with the country’s score also dropping to 48 compared to 51 in 2020.
The score of 48 was also Malaysia’s lowest in nearly a decade.
MACC responded by saying it took Malaysia’s falling CPI ranking seriously and will propose changes to address this.