Thursday, March 1, 2012

Elderly man probed over Dr M's 'letter' to Israeli PM

Source: http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/190659 (By Lee Long Hui, 29/2/2012)
An elderly man who allegedly spread seditious emails is being probed by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), after chief secretary to the government Sidek Hassan forwarded the emails to the commission and urged it to investigate.
Liew Khooi Cheng, 73, a former chairperson of the Taman Tun Dr Ismail (TTDI) Residents' Association, was called by the MCMC to the TTDI police station today for his statement to be recorded.
Liew was alleged to have spread two emails to members of the public that contained seditious elements:
- An email sent on Dec 3 last year called on the people to boycott Gardenia bread and to support Massimo bread.
- An email sent on Feb 16 this year had as an attachment a letter dated Aug 16, 1999, which allegedly was sent by former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad to the prime minister of Israel to solicit funds for Umno for its general election campaign.
Liew was accompanied by two lawyers, DAP Segambut MP Lim Lip Eng and Tan Hui Chuan.
Tan said MCMC assistant director of enforcement and investigation, Mohamad Syukri Jamaluddin, recorded Liew’s statement.
Speaking to the press later, Lim said the officer told Liew that the commission had received a public complaint against these emails, and had successfully traced Liew's email account as the source. Lim claimed that the officer admitted that it was Sidek Hassan who forwarded the emails and urged the MCMC to investigate, but that Sidek was not the one who had lodged the complaint.
“I asked him (Syukri), who the complainant was, but he didn’t answer. Then I asked how many complainants there were and he said 'only one',” Lim added.
Liew said he had never seen the emails in question. However, Liew said that he had previously see similar contents somewhere else, but stressed that “I have never seen these emails before”. ‘I have nothing to do with Sidek Hassan’ He also clarified that he did not know Sidek personally, and had never sent any emails to him. “I have nothing to do with Sidek Hassan. I don’t know him, why must I send something to him?” he queried. Liew said he had told Syukri that his email account has been hacked before. He said he received many emails every day from friends on all kinds of subjects, from the environment, to health and politics.
He said that some of the contents of the emails were items copied from online news portals and blogs such as Malaysiakini, Malaysia Today and Malaysian Chronicle. “I am not able to look through everything, there are so many emails. I would glance through them and pass them on,” Liew said. Most of the time, he would delete such emails after reading and forwarding them to close friends.
Liew refused to comment on whether the investigation by the MCMC was uncalled-for, and said the commission should be allowed to carry out its investigation.
Related news: Senior citizen quizzed over ‘anti-establishment’ e-mails http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/2012/02/29/senior-citizen-quizzed-over-anti-establisment-e-mails/
Retiree under probe http://www.nst.com.my/local/general/retiree-under-probe-1.53889

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