E Contrario

Work Minister Samy Vellu told the press that the public has NO right to know the content of highway concession agreements. He said a toll agreements is “It is part of a government document which cannot be revealed.”

At a press conference on 2 February, Samy attacked PROTES leaders for revealing details of the document in public and “blowing the matter out of proportion”.

“They take it, they exhibit it and they did a big drama with it,” Samy emphasized that those who revealed the documents must be penalized.

Fine, we heard you loud and clear. Samy has implicitly admitted he has instructed police to go against us. Still, he has not told us whether the LDP agreement and other concession agreements are classified secret under the Official Secret Act (OSA). He never specifically said when these contracts had been stamped OSA. I suspect the douments were announced official secret only in the last cabinet meeting. Again, we can never know this fact because cabinet meeting minutes are automatically classified OSA documents.

Samy went on to take a swipe on me:

“Tian Chua and others have no right to reveal it. He’s like a small boy playing on the street. He’s a grown up man. He should know that it’s an official secret document, yet he revealed it.

“He knew the consequences of his action. So he has to face the consequences.”

Yes, Minister, I understand the consequence. When one see a crime, it is a duty of all citizens to blow whistle even if one has no power to stop it. Consequence of that one could be slashed by the burglar. Knowing this, should we close one eye to crime?

The real issue is that the government signed agreements contra to public interest. We are not sure it was a deliberate act or mere negligence. Whatever it was, Samy is paying for its consequence with his credibility.