In his latest blog posting, the former premier questioned the idea of setting up 1MDB and the big money spent to purchase some business entities.
As usual, Najib and his PMO team did not give any response to such critics.
This is the latest in Dr Mahathir's series of attacks against Najib's administration.Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has raised questions about the heavy debt and usage of funds at 1MDB in his first open criticism of the controversial government-owned investment company started by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.Writing in his blog yesterday, the former prime minister noted that 1MDB had spent billions of ringgit buying power plants from Genting and Ananda Krishnan and had paid above market prices for them.
He also lamented that 1MDB is heavily indebted. It has debt of around RM38 billion after just five years in operation as the country's sovereign wealth fund.
"The money for 1MDB is not from the country's surpluses. It is debt, billions of ringgit of debt that has added to the already high national debt," Dr Mahathir wrote.
The former PM, who recently wrote he was withdrawing support from Najib, said as the government was already facing a deficit budget problem, it would not have the ability to help pay the 1MDB debt.
He also noted that a large part of the money raised from the issue of debt paper by 1MDB has been sent to the Cayman Islands, a move which many has questioned.
Critics have complained about the lack of transparency in how the money is managed out of Cayman and it has been estimated that at least RM18 billion of 1MDB's money is parked there.
I don't see this 'open forum critic' as healthy for BN, which continuously comes under attack from various sectors of the community, especially with regard to the Sedition Act.
Do we really need to continue such a trend?