BN chieftain threatens to beat-up journalist for asking
Apr 8: An UMNO leader in the Batu constituency yesterday threatened to assault a reporter when the latter attempted to ask him over the use of a government department van for BN's campaign there.
"Hey! You are lucky I haven’t smacked you yet," snapped an irate Barisan Nasional leader Suhaimi Yahya (pic) to Malaysiakini's Koh Jun Lin.
Koh had been referred to Suhaimi by BN Batu secretary Rodzi Tajudin to ask about the use of government department vehicles for the launching of the BN's command centre yesterday. One of the vehicles was a SUV equipped with loudspeakers on its roof to broadcast speeches during the event.
Soon after Rodzi's threat, another man wearing a BN shirt warned Koh to leave. "Don’t cause trouble...Don’t you dare look back," the portal quoted him as telling.
The use of public-funded government machinery to aide BN's campaign, especially after the dissolution of parliament, has been frequently cited by observers as a violation of BN's current status as a caretaker government.
Prior to this, the Election Commission said it has no power to introduce guidelines on caretaker government to prevent misuse of public funds.
“If EC does have the power on this matter, it doesn’t mean that they will follow,” said EC chief Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof.
Source:
http://en.harakahdaily.net/index.php/berita-utama/7013-bn-chieftain-threatens-to-beat-up-journalist-for-asking.html
I can't get over EC Chief's defeatist attitude. With such a lame election referee, how can we expect a free and fair General Election? Rais, as caretaker Information Minister, ought to be ashamed for such blatant disregard in the use of government facilities. The election campaign has not even started and we have to put up with such shenanigans. It sure made a mockery of Najib as a signatory and his pledge to Transparency International Malaysia, and his much publicised 'Janji ditepati'.
Update:
According to Malaysiakini report in Facebook:
We spotted three Information Department trucks during the launch of the Batu BN operation centre by Umno deputy chief Muhyiddin Yassin.
We spoke to the event organisers about this but we were given an earful and threatened with violence...
http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/226098
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