INTERVIEW | For the country's new Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng, there is much to be done and his immediate priority, he said, is to clean up the mess left behind by his predecessor.

He finds himself in new territories every day, and his daily discoveries have brought him sleepless nights.

"Sometimes, I cannot sleep in the night, because every day, there are time bombs found somewhere or another," Lim said in an interview with Malaysiakini in Penang over the weekend.

Since assuming office in Putrajaya, Lim has found the time to return to Penang on weekends, to meet his constituents, both in the parliamentary seat of Bagan on the mainland and the Air Putih state seat on the island.

But his immediate task in his new portfolio is to "heal the nation by healing the country's financial condition".

However, this can only be done by being truthful and transparent, he said, and by knowing what the country's actual financial status is.

In several interviews with the media since he took office, Lim has revealed that he discovered many hidden or "red files" in the ministry, where the documents were only accessible to then prime minister and finance minister Najib Abdul Razak.

Najib, who is the MP for Pekan, was ousted in the May 9 general election and is currently being investigated for money laundering activities related to the 1MDB scandal...