Malaysia’s Economic Affairs Minister sued for failing to pay travel bills

Economic Affairs Minister Azmin Ali is being sued for accumulating unpaid bills to a travel agency amounting to more than RM300,000.

YHA Travel & Tours (M) Sdn Bhd, in statement of claim filled in KL Sessions Court last week, said Azmin accumalated the huge bills for family holiday trips abroad over the course of six months this year.

Azmin, who is also PKR Deputy President which is the country’s biggest party in parliament, was earlier embroiled in a sex video scandal involving the party’s youth chief, Haziq Abdullah Abdul Aziz that rocked the party and nation.

Among the unpaid bills was one for a visit to Sandakan during which the nefarious incident was alleged to have taken place.

What is unnerving is not the fact that the Economics Affairs Minister failed to pay but rather the massive bill of RM300,000.00 over a short span of six months.

Once touted as a possible successor to Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Azmin’s chances of replacing former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim seems to be fading by the hour.

This latest public disclosure of unpaid bills for personal travel has raised questions as to his ability to manage Malaysia’s economy as well as deal with a staggering RM 1 trillion debt accumulated during former Prime Minister Najib Razak’s tenure under the Barisan Nasional government.

Meanwhile, Dr Mahathir, in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, reiterated that Anwar would be the one who would eventually take over the premiership.
Whether Azmin’s latest public fiasco has anything to do with Dr Mahathir’s statement is unclear.

What is clear is that a series of embarrassing episodes seem to be plaguing the Pakatan Harapan government over the last three months. -/TISG