Minister urges Dzulkifli to continue carrying out his duty while speculations abound on who’s out to get the MACC’s top official.
- Video uploaded online exposing alleged affair with married woman
- Flight and hotel check-in details, pictures of alleged romantic rendezvous in Bali in July
- Police investigating case under a law that prohibits a man from enticing a married woman in order to have sex with her
- The law provides a punishment of two years’ jail, a fine, or both
- Speculations on the masterminds behind the smear campaign – corrupt politicians, gambling bosses
Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak urged Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief commissioner Tan Sri Dzulkifli Ahmad to remain steadfast and not succumb to underhanded tactics to undermine him
He called on the country’s chief graft-buster to continue with his efforts to clean up the country from the scourge of corruption.
Salleh said this in his latest posting following allegations of extramarital affair levelled against Dzulkifli, national news agency Bernama reported.
“In 2015, when they thought the MACC could be used to attack Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, those opposed to the government would visit the MACC head office and would sing the praises of the MACC and worshipped the ground that the then MACC Chief Commissioner walked on.
“Today, Dzulkifli is being brutally attacked. If they can use you then you are a god-send and if they cannot use you then they will go to any length to discredit you, humiliate you, tarnish your image, and destroy your reputation with lies, slander and fabricated allegations of all sorts of imagined ‘crimes’,” Salleh was quoted as saying.
In this respect, Salleh urged Dzulkiflli to ignore such condemnation and continue carrying out his duty “because as a senior and high profile public servant, being subjected to attacks comes with the territory, the more you do your job the more you will suffer attacks”.
As for the people responsible for the video which has surfaced online supposedly exposing the allegations of the extramarital affair, Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun said police must be given enough time to investigate the matter.
“If we have to make arrests, we will. But as of now, we haven’t made any.
“We are trying hard to find those responsible. As far as I know, the MACC (Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission) has not made a (police) report,” Fuzi was quoted as saying by The Star today.
He added that the case of the alleged affair was being investigated under Section 498 of the Penal Code for enticing, with criminal intent, a married woman.
Section 498 is a colonial-era law that prohibits a man from enticing a married woman in order to have sex with her and is punishable with two years’ jail, a fine, or both.
A well-known case under Section 498 was in 2009 where the ex-husband of TV personality Daphne Iking used the law to accuse another man of seducing her with the intention of having sex.
Women’s rights groups have called for the abolition of the law, saying it painted women as the property of their husbands.
Meanwhile, speculations abound over who is out to get the MACC’s top official and masterminding the ongoing smear campaign to discredit him through exposing the video alleging a romantic rendezvous in Bali in July, complete with flight and hotel check-in details as well as pictures.
According to media reports, the MACC’s Corruption Prevention Advisory Board president Tunku Aziz Tunku Ibrahim speculated it was the work of those who want the MACC to fail in carrying out its aggressive graft-busting by destroying its credibility.
“For the longest time, a lot of people, in particular, the opposition, claimed that MACC is only interested in ‘ikan bilis’ (anchovies) and now sharks.
“But now, MACC is not like that. Every day, every week, someone is being nabbed for graft and brought to justice.
“Corrupt politicians are feeling unease. They want (the top officer) to fail by questioning his morality.
“They want him to fail by destroying his reputation and credibility to affect MACC’s credibility,” Tunku Aziz was quoted as saying.
However, Utusan Malaysia’s senior news editor Zulkiflee Bakar offered a different perspective, speculating that illegal gambling bosses are behind the smear campaign.
In an editorial today, he claimed that these criminals have been compromising enforcement authorities with bribes and that they are in the MACC’s crosshairs.
“The (gambling bosses) are hiding behind benevolent corporations. These are the tactics of the gambling ‘tauke’ who have ‘Tan Sri’ or ‘Datuk’ titles.
“This makes it difficult to shut down gambling syndicates because they are hiding behind legitimate businesses.
“However, when they see MACC’s vigorous efforts to stamp out graft and abuses, the syndicates and their beneficiaries in enforcement agencies cannot sit still,” wrote Zulkiflee.