Death Railway Compensation: Malaysians Want Answers

It was indeed shocking to learn that the Japanese government might have paid over to the Malaysian government in 1990s, during Mahathir's time, some 207 billion ringgit compensation as 'blood money' for the 30,000 Malaysians who were forced to work on the railway of death.

It was even more shocking to learn that the money might have been used to set up the Malaysian International Shipping Corporation (MISC) instead, instead of being rightly given to the survivors of the Death Railway or to their families.

If true, Malaysians want to know how much of the compensation had been used to set up MISC and whether any of the compensation left had been paid to the Death Railway survivors or to their families and how much.

And whether MISC had later played a part in helping to bailout a shipping company allegedly belonging to a son of a former prime minister?

207 billion ringgit is not a piffling sum of money by any standard and that money was supposed to have been paid over to the Death Railway survivors or to their families as 'blood money' for their pain and suffering.

No government can be so callous as not to have done what it should have done.

Najib's administration owes the rakyat an explanation on the matter and anyone found responsible of any wrong doing in connection with the compensation must be hauled up to account.

It is strange that the Umno led government which is otherwise so ready to claim credit for the slightest thing they do, like ditching out the once in a half century one off BRIM 500 ringgit assistance, had been so quiet all these years on the matter of the Death Railway survivors' reparation from the Japanese government.

Didn't it want to claim credit for helping the survivors or their families to obtain reparation, if indeed the money had been given out to them?