Malaysia Chronicle
Is it any surprise that a close crony to Mahathir Mohamad is making the news? It was merely a matter of time before news leaked out that all is not well for these businessmen, who became rich beyond imagination during the time when the authoritarian Mahathir was prime minister of Malaysia.
Ananda Krishnan, who has long been regarded in Malaysia as one of former premier Mahathir Mohamad’s closest cronies, has found himself in trouble in India. To many who have been watching the local economic scene where big business is often intertwined with politics, this is a deep irony.
Ananda and Maxis senior executive Ralph Marshal are now part of a probe by India’s Central Bureau of Investigation into claims that Dayandhi Maran, the country’s Minister of Telecommunications between February 2004 and May 2007, had been involved in criminal conspiracy, fraud and corruption in granting telecommunications licenses to operations that may include Maxis.
So we are left to wonder, if there is corruption to be weeded, why must it be a foreign agency that does the weeding? Why is the Malaysian authority last on the scene – if they get to the scene at all, that is. Remeber the 2010 fiasco in London where the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission was ‘forbidden’ at the 11th hour to take down a statement from private investigator P Balasubramaniam with regards to the Altantuya murder and Scorpenes kickback case.
What a sharp contrast when the French financial police opened wide their doors for Bala, while the MACC slammed theirs tightly shut! And Bala’s information must have checked out quite well because the French authorities have given the green light for an investigative judge to hear the case, which should begin soon.
Arm-twisted
But the question remains, why is Malaysia so ‘reliant’ on utilizing foreign ‘help’ to conduct their menial tasks so much so that even investigating corruption cases must be sub-contracted to a foreign agency? Is the MACC afraid to investigate anything that has ties to Mahathir or the Umno elite?
Ultimately, most business ties in Malaysia leads back to Mahathir, mainly because he was in charge for such a long time from 1981 to 2003. And this may be the stumbling block for the MACC and any other agency investigating instances of corruption in large Malaysian firms. It is an old-boys network that is extremely hard to crack.
Malaysians can expect MACC to pretend not to hear or see what’s going on with the India's Central Bureau of Investigation. It will surely turn a blind eye to investigating Ananda Krishnan as it has with other cronies of Mahathir Mohamad, including the likes of Tajudin Ramli or Tun Daim Zainuddin and even Tony Fernandes.
Perhaps the ill-repute of the Umno elite and their hold over the MACC is better known worldwide than they care to acknowledge. It is telling that Mumbai-based newspaper The Indian Express has reported that the Enforcement Directorate, which combats money laundering and foreign currency leakages, has stepped up investigations into Aircel, which is the Indian mobile phone operator that Ananda bought and for which he is being probed.
ED officials will send a letter rogatory, which is a formal request from a court to a foreign court, to Malaysia seeking legal assistance to question Ananda and Marshall. But surprise! surprise! The Malaysian judiciary is just as ‘independent’ as the MACC!
Shifting sands
It seems that AirAsia’s Tony too has discovered that the sweetest fountain of prosperity still belongs to Mahathir rather than to his successor Abdullah Badawi, or to Najib, the sitting PM. Having won public backing from Mahathir, the AirAsia boss has now distanced himself from Badawi and the latter's circle, which includes son-in-law Khairy Jamaluddin, who had previously held great influence over the government.
This shows that Mahathir is still numero uno in both the corridors of power in Putrajaya as well as in corporate Malaysia, where some of the richest and most powerful business players owe their success to his direct intervention when he was still prime minister.
Sadly for Malaysia, Mahathir is not a democrat at heart, and this may be an understatement. Some of his actions in the past indicate an outright autocratic streak.
Over the years he resented institutional checks on his Executive powers and plotted to have them removed. He was ruthless with those who opposed him. As early as 1983, he unilaterally cut away many of the privileges belonging to the Royalty. He also made the Internal Security Act more severe on the pretext of preventing racial tensions, with more curbs on the media, used federal funds to force the politically ‘disobedient’ states to toe the line, interfered with the judiciary, and in 1988 sacked the Lord President for “gross misconduct”. In case that was not enough, Mahathir also sacked five more Supreme Court Judges for good measure.
Yet Mahathir was the most popular and most powerful leader in Malaysia during his time. It was as if the country was under a fog, with few daring enough to challenge and expose him. Mahathir became a power unto himself, brooking no intereference, not even from international bodies. Going against conventional wisdom and disregarding any public apprehension over the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Mahathir introduced currency controls and weathered the storm refusing advice from the IMF.
His affirmative action in Bumiputra policies did not evoke the bitterness that was experienced in other countries such as Indonesia. Perhaps he was lucky or maybe as president of UMNO, Mahathir wielded enough authority over the Malays to keep them in check. It looks like he is still an influential factor despite the passing years and Malaysia has seen two other prime ministers succeeding him.
Umno elite kiss and tell
Very notably, in recent months Mahathir has become more vocal about his dissatisfaction with Najib Razak, who is seen by many as a bungling prime minister and destined to lead the BN and Umno to defeat in the coming 13th general election.
Obviously, Najib will not take this lightly and surely more news concerning the wrongdoings of Mahathir and his cronies will see the light of day. Yes, this is another favourite ploy amongst the Umno warlords. They kiss and tell among themselves.
Such moves by the Najib camp in using bad press to gag a rival seems to have worked against Abdullah Badawi. Badawi was easily silenced after the news of efforts to bribe him in connection with a banknote contract surfaced. It followed soon after Badawi’s meeting with Ambiga Sreenevasan, the head of the outlawed Bersih rally for free and fair elections. But Mahathir is not Abdullah and will not be easily cowed with bad press.
So Malaysians can expect more headlines concerning Mahathir's cronies to hit the news as he takes on Najib. And while all this is going on, Malaysia will remain in limbo as the world steps closer to an economic recession that even Mahathir admits will take a very long time to recover from. So for Ananda, there is some Dutch comfort, he won’t be alone in the global limelight for long.
Mengulas pengumuman tersebut, Presiden Anak, Mazlan Aliman berkata, penyenaraian tersebut hanya akan membuatkan nasib peneroka terumbang ambing kerana yang akan mendapat keuntungan besar melalui penyenarain itu ialah syarikat-syarikat besar.
