‘They have gone overboard with their allegations’
KUCHING: Local Government and Housing Minister Datuk Seri Dr Sim Kui Hian have initiated a legal action against Democratic Action Party (DAP) leaders.
This came after the former was a subject of malicious allegations by the latter over the state government’s food distribution funding.
Dr Sim said a legal letter would be issued to parties involved by his counsel.
“They have gone overboard with their persistent, repeated and malicious attacks without basis and without verifying the facts beforehand.
“Under the circumstances, I have instructed my lawyers to issue legal letters to all the parties concerned,” he said, describing the remarks made against him as “highly defamatory”.
He added that despite the accuser’s knowledge of procedures involved in distributing the allocations for food aid, the personal attacks kept on piling up.
“It is an indisputable fact that all those food assistance funding was allocated by the Sarawak government to all Divisional Disaster Management Committees (DDMC) throughout Sarawak, and not to any Adun’s (members of parliament) service centre.
“Knowing this, DAP leaders continued to make false accusations and repeated the same against me through both social media and the local daily with malicious intent to disparage my character and untruthfully accused me of having abused my position by misappropriating and misusing those funds,” he said.
Dr Sim was referring to certain defamatory remarks made recently by several DAP leaders in the papers, including one by Sarawak chairman Chong Chieng Jen accusing Dr Sim of wrongfully taking control of food aid funds allocated for Padungan, Batu Lintang, Pending and Kota Sentosa, totalling RM800,000.
He proceeded to remind that there is no room for any untruthful politicking or any false accusation amid the unprecedented nationwide crisis.
“Like I said on several occasions, in view of the intensity of battling the Covid-19 pandemic at our doorsteps, our top priority has to be focused on beating the crisis by assuring all Sarawakians that our home can one day be safe like before ― free from the disease.
“As such, our healthcare and enforcement frontliners have to risk their lives every day to achieve the above goal,” said Dr Sim.
