8 Jan 2013

Mahfuz urges Agong to call Parliament session

PAS vice-president Mahfuz Omar has urged the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to call a parliamentary special session for His Majesty's government and Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak to clear the air over the revelations made by Deepak Jaikishan over his role in the retraction of the statutory declaration.

Mahfuz (right), in calling for the special session, said he will seek an appointment with the Agong Tuanku Abdul Halim to submit a memorandum for this purpose.

"I hope the Agong will grant me an audience and permit in calling the special parliamentary session before Feb 25, as after that I fear the parliament may be dissolved.

"I feel it is necessary for Najib to explain the role played by his younger brother in retracting the first statutory declaration by  P Balasubramaniam, which was allegedly facilitated by Deepak," he said, adding he had faxed a letter to the Agong’s private secretary this morning to seek the audience..

The Pokok Sena MP finds it surprising that since the revelation was made by Deepak, neither the government, nor Najib have reacted to his claims.

He said that if the allegations were untrue, Najib should have resorted to taking action on Deepak.

Keeping mum, Mahfuz said, would affect the reputation of His Majesty's government and the Agong himself.
The PAS vice-president said he admired Social Just Care foundation chairperson Robert Phang’s  filing of a legal action against former inspector-general of police Musa Hassan for making unfounded allegations against him in saying Phang had prevented the transfer of certain police officers and also was linked to criminal activities.

“This is an option to clear someone’s name. However, neither Najib nor the government has said anything to this revelation made by Deepak and chosen to keep mum. This will tarnish the image of the government,” he said.

“I am not saying the allegation made by Deepak is true but the PM has the duty to respond to it,” he said.

Asked that normally the Agong acts on the advise of the prime minister, and if the prime minister does not call for the session, Mahfuz said that this situation is unwarranted and akin to treason as Najib has to call for the session to clear his name in His Majesty’s government.

Graduate teachers left in the lurch

Mahfuz also said that graduate teachers have also been left in the lurch as a huge number of the 10,715 teachers who graduated in January 2012 have not received their postings.

“This has resulted as the Education Ministry headed by Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, has not handled the situation better. With the new graduate teachers graduating this year, this will not alleviate but worsen the situation.

“I am not just talking about the teachers produced in the universities but also the Teachers Training Institute who have have yet to receive their postings. This is made much more worse with some of the students having to repay their National Higher Education Loans (PTPTN),” he said.

Previously, PKR director of strategy Rafizi Ramli had said that besides the graduates from the public institutions, private universities like Universiti Tun Abdul Razak have been producing graduate teachers and they, too, are facing problems to gain employment due to the Education Ministry’s policy of catering to graduates of public institutions first.


Source : http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/218287

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