Paper trail will prove Zuraida’s innocence, aide says

PETALING JAYA: The trail of documents will prove that minister Zuraida Kamaruddin was not involved in negotiations or did not give her approval for two government projects that were awarded via direct negotiation during the Pakatan Harapan administration, says her political secretary Nor Hizwan Ahmad.

Instead, he is claiming that the negotiations were carried out by then finance minister Lim Guan Eng himself.

Zuraida is the Local Government and Housing Minister.

“I am very sure the ministry has a record of all the documents and has the chronology of how the projects finally received the green light from the Finance Ministry to go ahead,” he said.

Zuraida was slammed by the Opposition after the Finance Ministry released a list of projects that were awarded by direct negotiation, with the ministry awarding two projects worth RM170.79mil.

The minister, who kept her post after the collapse of the Pakatan government six months ago, stressed that she was unaware of the government contracts awarded via direct negotiation involving her ministry.

“The ministry is committed to carrying out investigations into the arising issue,” Zuraida said in an earlier statement.

Separately, in Parliament House, several Opposition MPs had demanded that Senior Minister Datuk Seri Azmin Ali be referred to the Rights and Privileges Committee over his claims that government projects given via direct negotiation did not receive the approval of the Cabinet.

Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail (PH-Kulim Bandar Baharu), a former Cabinet minister, said after reviewing the list he was confident that the projects were presented to the Cabinet and claimed

Azmin’s accusation was false.

“I ask that the Speaker make a ruling based on Standing Order 36 (12) on this issue,” he said in the Dewan Rakyat yesterday.

Under Standing Order 36 (12), any member of the Dewan Rakyat who imputes statements that mislead the House is deemed to be in contempt of the House and the member may be referred to the Committee of Privileges for such an offence.

On Monday, during the debates, Azmin, who was also a minister during the Pakatan administration, interjected and said the list was not presented to the Cabinet.