KUALA LUMPUR — An investigation by Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) into Lembaga Tabung Haji’s (TH) management from 2017 to the present is sufficient, instead of forming another Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI), said Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
Zahid said he supported the proposal for a PAC investigation which was put forth by several Members of Parliament at the “Reality and Perception: Don’t Politicise Tabung Haji” forum today to examine and clarify aspects of TH’s governance and management as raised in the RCI report on TH covering the period from 2014 to 2020.
Zahid said a PAC investigation can clarify what had happened after 2017 based on facts and reality, while also helping to correct public perceptions regarding TH’s management and governance.
“In my view, this is a recommendation that should be followed so that there are no accusations of ‘embezzlement’, (whereby) the certificate issued by the National Audit Department was a clean certificate with the audit on TH conducted based on the department’s governing Act.
“The Tabung Haji Act 1995 states that the National Audit Department is responsible for auditing it.
“This is what the PAC should look into so that the facts can correct public perceptions and reflect the reality that the public wants to know,” he told reporters after attending the forum organised by the Musyawarah Nasional (National Consultation) dialogue platform here today.
During the forum earlier, former auditor-general Tan Sri Dr Madinah Mohamad defended the department’s audit of TH from accusations of audit failure because the department’s findings were different from an audit done by PriceWaterhouseCoopers.
Madinah said the two audits had different terms of reference and utilised different methodologies in the way they valued impairments and investments, among others.
The National Audit Department had also been blamed for failing to raise TH’s weaknesses after it said it found no evidence of embezzlement or misappropriating during its audit.
Zahid today said PAC has the mandate and responsibility to conduct an investigation into TH.
“I do not think it needs to be brought to the Cabinet…what was informally proposed earlier by the MPs should be given priority…for the PAC to establish an investigative body.”
He also said an investigation by PAC would be more suitable rather than establishing another RCI to probe TH’s management from 2017 to the present.
“I think the PAC is more suitable to conduct the investigation because it has the locus standi, as set out in the PAC’s own duties and responsibilities,” he said.
In an immediate response to Free Malaysia Today, PAC chairman Datuk Bas Ermieyati Samsudin said she would obtain the views of all committee members on the proposal for it to open an investigation into TH. – August 25, 2026