Several interest groups and political parties have supported the call to set up a royal commission to investigate major financial scandals involving the government under the rule of former premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Transparency International-Malaysia Chapter president Ramon Navaratnam said the body supports any initiative to improve good governance, integrity and transparency in the country.

"It is important for us to establish the truth," he told malaysiakini when contacted

Ramon stressed that it was important to hold those responsible to full accountability if the cases involved public interest.

He also suggested that the current parliamentary select committee on integrity - headed by Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Bernard Dompok - should probe these scandals.

Responding to a question, he said there were many corruption cases that must be investigated, including the Perwaja Steel scandal.

The call to set up the commission was made by Parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang yesterday following the starling revelations made by ex-Malaysia Airlines (MAS) chief Tajudin Ramli.

Among others, Tajudin claimed that he was instructed by Mahathir and then second finance minister Daim Zainuddin to buy MAS shares as a 'national service'.

Wider scope

Meanwhile, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) deputy president Dr Syed Husin Ali said the setting up of the commission should go beyond the Tajudin-MAS scandal.

"The idea (for the commission) is to have a wider scope. There are so many scandals that the whole scenario should be re-examined focusing on mismanagement and corruption," he added

Syed Husin said the scandals involving Perwaja, Renong group, the Malaysian International Shipping Corporation (MISC) and the PSC-Naval Dockyard Sdn Bhd should be on the commission's priority list.

He was referring to the government's bailout of Renong in its takeover of United Engineers Malaysia (UEM), which controlled a 32.6 percent stake in Renong, in 2001.

Renong was dubbed as Malaysia's most debt-burdened conglomerate and had over RM13 billion in outstanding debt. The takeover was financed by the government's investment arm Khazanah Nasional Bhd.

Whereas the Petronas-controlled MISC stepped in to acquire debt-laden Konsortium Perkapalan Bhd's (KPV) shipping assets with cash in 1998. KPB, owned by Mahathir's son, Mirzan, was submerged with debts estimated at around RM1.7 billion.

PSC, meanwhile, was embroiled in a controversial multi-billion-ringgit contract to build 27 high-tech vessels for the Malaysian navy. The contract was intact despite its delay to deliver after the government invested RM2.5 billion in the project.

Syed Husin also suggested that the proposed commission should also look into the ongoing allegations surrounding the customs department.

Present scandals

Also expressing support for the commission was PAS vice-president Husam Musa.

"We can look at past and current issues but if we look at the past we might forget the present. So we should deal with both together.

"We would like to see a clarification on the Avenue Capital Resources Bhd and ECM Libra issue involving (Umno Youth deputy chief) Khairy Jamaluddin," he said when contacted.

It has been asked how Khairy, Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's 31-year-old son-in-law, could raise RM9.2 million to acquire a three percent stake in boutique investment house ECM Libra Bhd.

A month afer Khairy obtained a direct stake in ECM Libra, the investment house merged with the government-owned financial services company Avenue Capital.

"The commission needs to layout the mechanism to not just discover old scandals but to prevent any future scandals and malpractice," said Husam.

Democracy and Anti-Corruption Movement (Gerak) executive coordinator Badrul Hisham said there should be an independent body to probe all the scandals, including the police reports lodged in the past.

On which scandals should be given priority, Badrul cited three: Perwaja, MAS bailout and toll concessionaire Metramac Corporation Sdn Bhd (Metramac) owned by Daim's protege, Halim Saad.

A recent court judgement claimed that Halim and his business partner Anuar Othman, under the patronage of Daim, had siphoned off RM32.5 million from Metramac.

However, Federation of Malaysian Consumers Association (Fomca) president N Marimuthu was skeptical of the effectiveness of such a commission.

"Look at the government-backed Royal Police Commission, what happened to their recommendations? Why waste so much money (to set up a commission)?" he asked.