MP SPEAKS | Najib has achieved two 'greats' in his life – making Malaysia a global kleptocracy, and now the first and only former prime minister to become the “king...of trolls.”

Campaigning for the Cameron Highlands by-election in the BN stronghold Felda Sungai Koyan, Najib boasted of his latest accomplishment on social media: “I have been crowned the 'King of Trolls'.

“What is the reason for this? It is because I fight them (the Pakatan Harapan government) every day with facts, not with lies.”

Yes, Najib does not tell ordinary lies, but only gargantuan ones.

At the 2017 Umno General Assembly, he blatantly and brazenly resorted to gargantuan lies when he accused the DAP of being anti-Malay and anti-Islam.

He said: “DAP yang terang terang anti-Melayu dan Islam, sebagai tercatat dalam perlembagaan DAP, langsung tidak meyebut Islam sebagai Agama Persekutuan. (DAP is clearly anti-Malay and anti-Islam, as its constitution does not mention Islam as the religion of the federation)."

Present at the AGM were the leaders of the other 12 BN components at the time, such as MCA, MIC, Gerakan and the Sabah and Sarawak parties, all of whom also do not state anything about the religion of the federation in their constitutions. 

Did Najib accuse the other 12 component parties, and therefore BN itself, of being anti-Malay and anti-Islam?

Najib resorted to the politics of fear and hatred by drumming baseless fears and hate at the AGM, as when he warned that if Harapan wins the 14th general election, “the Malays will be vagabonds, cursed and despised, until they ‘terbangsat’ (become bastardised) in their own homeland.”

This is indeed a gargantuan lie.

This was why I commented on Najib’s presidential speech, saying:

“Najib should know that if Harapan defeats the Umno-BN coalition in the next general election, the Harapan federal government will be doing its utmost in the next five years to prove that it is better than the Umno-BN government in protecting and promoting the rights and interests of all Malaysians, especially the Malays and Islam, and no one will be ‘terbangsat’ in their own land, or it will lose the mandate to govern and be repudiated in the subsequent general election five years later in 2023.”

I believe Malaysians will not forget the Umno lies in the last general election that I, and not Dr Mahathir Mohamad, would become prime minister if Harapan emerged victorious in GE14.

But Najib’s most gargantuan lies is undoubtedly his denial that there is anything amiss with the 1MDB scandal, although it is the constant subject in international media and has made Malaysia the butt of international jokes for becoming a global kleptocracy.

Najib would have continued with his fantastic denial complex if Goldman Sachs, despite an “exorbitant fee” of some US$600 million, broke ranks and apologised to the people of Malaysia for its role in the 1MDB scandal.

This completely unexpected apology from Goldman had taken Najib by surprise, and caused him to admit for the first time that the although the 1MDB scandal was a national catastrophe, the blame for the 1MDB scandal cannot be pinned on him as it was a systemic failure involving the bank, which had been paid an “exorbitant fee.”

But Najib did not tell the Cameron Highlands voters, although he is leading the by-election campaign, why he should be acquitted of any responsibility for the monstrous and heinous 1MDB scandal, and how parties like Goldman must bear responsibility for the “systemic failure” resulting in Malaysia becoming a global kleptocracy.

It is still not too late for Najib to do a 'tell-all' on the 1MDB scandal as the by-election voting is only on Jan 26. Is he prepared to do so?

I do not think he is capable. Najib is not a victim but the very person responsible for the system resulting in the monstrous and heinous 1MDB scandal, which became the largest kleptocratic scandal handled by the US Department of Justice. The victims were not Najib and his ministers but the 32 million Malaysians.

How can Najib claim innocence and to be a victim of a systemic failure, when in the two years after the DOJ filed its largest kleptocratic litigation to forfeit US$1.7 billion out of US$4.5 billion 1MDB-linked assets in the United States, the United Kingdom and Switzerland, and the criminal proceedings against several bankers in Singapore linked to the international corruption and money-laundering scandal, Najib and his ministers, as well as the political leaders of the 13-party BN, continued to close their eyes, shut their ears and run away from the truth?

I shudder to think what would be position today if Umno-BN had continued to be the government with Najib as the prime minister.

A 'troll' has been defined as a person who starts quarrels or upsets people on the Internet to distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory and digressive, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community with the intent of provoking readers into displaying emotional responses, normalising tangential discussion, whether for the troll's amusement or a specific gain.

Media attention in recent years has equated trolling with online harassment. Experienced participants in online forums know that the most effective way to discourage a troll is usually to ignore it, because responding tends to encourage trolls to continue disruptive posts – hence the often-seen warning: "Please do not feed the trolls."

I do not know whether Malaysians should lament and rue that the former prime minister of Malaysia prides himself on becoming the “king of trolls”.

Maybe Najib has finally found his best vocation.

LIM KIT SIANG is the MP for Iskandar Puteri.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.