Suara Keadilan retracts fake Anwar article

PKR mouthpiece Suara Keadilan has retracted an article purportedly written by its de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim after realising it is a fake.

In a notice on the Suara Keadilan website today, the newspaper said the article, Why do we need to seize Putrajaya: An address from the opposition leader ahead of the 13th general election, was not written by Anwar as claimed.

The full-page article appeared on page 18 of the newspaper’s latest edition, published on Jan 10.

The retraction also quoted Anwar’s media coordinator Eekmal Ahmad saying: “We deny that the article came from Anwar or his office”.

Among others, the article states that if the author was indeed a sodomite, he would carry out such sexual practices overseas to avoid persecution.

“I teach in an American university. It is a free country. If I was desperate to sodomise someone, I could have done it there with anyone I like.

“Why would I do such a wrong thing in my own country, where I am politically active, have a family, and have thousands of friends and acquaintances?” the article says.

The author also purportedly wrote about false accusations against him in the past.

“Don’t forget, several individuals involved in making false accusations against me had died tragically or had fallen with strange illnesses,” says the article.

It also mentions former PKR leaders Ezam Mohd Nor and Zulkifli Noordin, about whom Anwar usually avoids commenting on.

"Pakatan Rakyat leaders with wicked ambitions to rob the country’s riches from the very beginning have been ousted by Allah through His trials, including Ezam and Zulkifli.

"Thank God," says the article.

'Work overload a reason for the mistake'

Contacted today, Suara Keadilan editor Fazallah Pit said the mistake
occurred because the staff had been overwhelmed by the workload on Monday.

That was the day of Anwar's Sodomy II trial verdict, as well as the weekly paper’s publication deadline.

“Jan 9 was very important for us and we were overloaded with work... and in that rush, it was easy for a mistake to happen,” he said.

Fazallah (left) said he received the article by email, but he could not recall when because he had received a lot of email around the time of the verdict date.

He believed it to be genuine and decided to publish it after another look, but this was not done due to the work overload.

He said he was told that the article was not from Anwar by several PKR leaders last night, and that the source of the email was being investigated.