The Malaysian Insider – 1 hour 12 minutes agoRELATED CONTENT
- Reveal audit on Youth Day celebrations, says PAS MP
An opposition lawmaker demanded that the audit by the Auditor-General on the overall management of the yearly Youth Day celebrations be made public.
Mahfuz Omar (PAS-Pokok Sena) said the costs of managing the event in the last four years totalled RM93 million.
"The costs had steadily increased since 2011," he said in citing figures for the event.
The cost for managing the celebrations in 2011 was RM16 million and the figure went up to RM28.91 million in 2012 and RM18.07 million last year.
Although the figures for this year has yet to be ascertained, Mahfuz said he was made to understand the celebrations cost RM30 million.
In his winding up of the Budget 2015 debate at the committee stage yesterday, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim confirmed that an audit was conducted on the overall management of the youth event but the details would not be made public as the Youth and Sports Ministry had given its commitment to rectify the shortcomings pointed out in the audit.
"I find this odd because the public and Parliament have the right to know about this as it involves taxpayers' money.
"Why can't this be made public? We want to hear what are the criticism and the problems arising from the overall management of the event," Mahfuz said at the Parliament lobby today.
He claimed the event was still rife with shortcomings, despite the ministry's pledge of improvement.
The ministry's annual Youth Day celebration is not without controversy.
The ministry's annual Youth Day celebration is not without controversy.
The 2012 Auditor-General’s Report had stated that the ministry paid RM1.6 million to bring three K-Pop groups to Malaysia for the celebrations.
It contradicted earlier statements by ministry officials who had said sponsorships covered the cost.
Former minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek had insisted that the ministry had received RM20 million from domestic and foreign corporate sponsors for the event.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) had cleared him from any wrongdoing over the money paid to the artistes as it did not find any elements of discrepancies or misappropriation of funds. – November 11, 2014.
