SHAH ALAM, 13 January – The state government says the purchase of Toyota Camrys to replace the Proton Perdana V6 Eksekutif as an official car, will not at all affect any of the state’s welfare projects to “Merakyatkan Ekonomi” that have been planned.

While stressing that the decision for that purchase was decided in last week’s State Executive Council meeting, Political Secretary to the Menteri Besar Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad said the issue had been twisted out of context by certain parties.

In a statement released by the Menteri Besar’s office, Nik Nazmi said that the purchase of Toyota Camrys for the Exco and senior state officers was made based on quotations that had been sent from car companies and not through open tender because the price had already been set by the state government.

He said, the decision to buy new cars was not made last year as there were no allocations at the time.

Referring to a statement by Dato’ Seri Dr Mohamad Khir Toyo in several newspapers, Nik Nazmi said the opposition leader’s views reflected his personality and Umno leadership’s shallow-mindedness.

“All these attacks by the opposition leader are actually baseless, since the Pakatan Rakyat which just took over the state’s leadership has successfully implemented all sorts of programs for the purpose of ‘Merakyatkan Ekonomi’,” he said.

Nik Nazmi also questioned the former Menteri Besar’s actions in approving the purchase of Mercedes Benz S350L at the price of RM917,214.00 whilst holding the post of Chairman of Kumpulan Darul Ehsan Berhad (KDEB), using funds allocated for the state government’s subsidiary company for personal use.

“Has he forgotten about the huge cost that the state government and its subsidiary companies had to shoulder as a result of management problems at the time? Has he forgotten how much profit was gained by the private sector via collaboration projects while the state government was ignored.

He added, the opposition leader should first do thorough research before making statements to ensure the comments were viewed positively rather than backfire as a result of being considered slanderous. – NOOR ALLIA KASSIM