PKR said it has received information that there would be attempts by certain quarters to try to implicate PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim during the royal commission of inquiry (RCI) on Sabah immigrants.

PKR deputy president Azmin Ali said PKR expects Umno and BN would use this move to overcome the problems that the RCI poses to the ruling  coalition , and expects this to come about any time soon.

NONE“We are now observing the proceedings closely. I have received various information that in the end, it will be linked to Anwar (right).

“(The ruling party) would eventually link all the problems in the country to Anwar,” he told a press conference at PKR headquarters in Petaling Jaya today.

Yesterday, several former National Registration Department (NRD) officers told the RCI in Kota Kinabalu that they were instructed to facilitate immigrants to vote during the 1990s and help install a BN-friendly state government.

These operations ranged from issuing IC receipts of existing voters to immigrants to issuing blue identity cards to unqualified immigrants.

Anwar, who as at one point in time then the deputy prime minister and Umno deputy president, is alleged to have played a key role in establishing Umno in Sabah in the early 90s, and in the BN takeover of the Borneo state immediately after the state election of 1994.

However, the PKR de facto leader has denied the allegations and claimed that he had been kept largely out of the loop in the “highly covert” operations.

"It was a special operation under the Prime Minister's Office and the Home Ministry at that time directly under Mahathir and (then deputy home minister) Megat Junid Megat Ayub,” Anwar had told Malaysiakini last year..

‘Mahathir traitor to nation’

Azmin also said that the allegations of the ‘citizenship-for-votes’ scheme proves former PM Dr Mahathir Mohamad is a traitor to the country.

NONEHe pointed out that all the agencies implicated in the allegations were under the Prime Minister’s Department at that time.

“We are following the developments and witness testimonies closely; several shocks have emerged, names have been named, and these are not surprising to us,” said Azmin.

“We truly understand this represents a planned effort headed by the then prime minister (left), and to me he is a traitor to the country for giving identity cards (IC) to foreigners just to shore up Umno’s political power.”

The revelations have also prompted Bersih co-chairperson Ambiga Sreenevasan to call on the Election Commission (EC) to explain.

When contacted, EC chairperson Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof said he has been given legal advice not to comment on the proceedings while it is ongoing, and that the EC itself would be giving testimony to the RCI sometime in February. 

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