Umno supreme council member Mohd Puad Zarkashi has been asked who is truly responsible for keeping the auditor-general’s report on 1MDB secret.

Petaling Jaya Utara Tony Pua MP asked this, since both the auditor-general and the public accounts committee (PAC) chairperson had intended for the report to be made public after the committee's deliberations.

Yesterday, Puad said former Umno deputy president Muhyiddin Yassin was wrong to fault Najib for classifying the report under the OSA, when it was on the request of the auditor-general himself.

"I had to laugh out loud when I read the comments made by Puad.

"Firstly, the auditor-general had only specifically requested for his report to be classified while it was being deliberated by the PAC. 

"He told the PAC that it is up to the PAC to publish the auditor-general’s report upon the completion of PAC’s own report," said Pua in a statement today.

He said PAC chairperson Hasan Arifin himself told the media on March 7: "The federal audit report on 1MDB will no longer be classified a state secret under the Official Secrets Act (OSA) once the PAC tables its findings on it in Parliament.”

"Hence if Prime Minister Najib Razak and his cabinet were not to be faulted for refusing to declassify the auditor-general’s report, then who is?" asked Pua.

Audit part of PAC report

He added the PAC report had intended to be tabled together with the audit report as a whole, and therefore makes numerous references to the details in the latter document.

Therefore, said Pua, it was ridicuous for Multimedia and Communications Minister Salleh Said Keruak to say there was no need for the auditor-general’s report to be made publicly accessible since the PAC report has already been tabled.

"The PAC in its proceedings, relies almost entirely on the findings of the auditor-general’s report to present its deliberations, conclusions and recommendations. 

"In fact, the PAC members understood that the auditor-general’s report was to be presented together with the PAC report to provide a complete picture with detailed facts and figures to the Parliament.

"Hence the PAC report itself made extensive references to the findings in the auditor-general’s report, without citing the details for the simple reason that the committee members were expecting the auditor-general’s report to be published together with the PAC report," said Pua.

"In fact, PAC members from the government backbench and opposition concurred fully with the auditor-general’s report and never at any point of time, as recorded in the PAC Hansard, disagreed or rejected the findings. 

"Hence all the findings in the auditor-general’s report must be deemed factual and dealt with accordingly by the authorities," he added.

Pua further commented on Puad's claim that the "bits" of the audit report being revealed leads to speculation, only reaffirms the need to disclose the full report.

"Why is Puad Zarkashi and the entire BN leadership so afraid for these facts within the auditor-general’s report to be published?

"If Puad is so worried about these 'bits' giving the wrong context, then surely, he must immediately advise his party president to declassify the full report immediately so as to prevent these 'bits' from being leaked by parties like the Sarawak Report," said Pua.

"Why is Puad so scared of declassifying the report? Unless of course, he knows that the auditor-general’s report contains damning evidence … " he added.