Rafidah Sidestep Najib?? ACA at MITI !!

According to Singapore's Straits Times, Rafidah's "MC" from the weekly cabinet meeting on Wednesday were seen as snub to Najib, who chaired the meeting while Abdullah is in US accompanying his wife (my prayers goes to her). The newspaper also claims that Rafidah is believed to be still within the country although local press has reported that she had left for Perth.

Bernama also quoted Najib as saying that Rafidah will explain to the Cabinet "whatever it needs to know" on the issue of APs at its meeting next week. Last Saturday, Najib had said the Cabinet would ask Rafidah to provide an explanation on claims by former prime minister Mahathir recently that she had misled delegates to Umno's general assembly last month regarding the issuing of the APs.

Is Rafidah trying to wait for Abdullah to come back from US in order to save her butt again?

Will Abdullah do it again after previous attempts which failed to put out the fire?

Is Najib trying to step up on his effort to get rid of the "Iron Lady"?

Amidst the rumors of an imminent cabinet reshuffle that was predicted in two months time, I personally would not bet on Abdullah to protect Rafidah anymore. It may be wise for Abdullah to stay out of this fight that involved two (maybe three including Mahathir) of Malaysia's most senior politicians.

If everything goes well, Abdullah still stands to become the biggest winner of all as he will be pressured to "retire" Rafidah along with other cabinet members namely Mohd Isa, who got suspended from UMNO and those losers in the last UMNO election (Azmi Khalid, Abdul Kadir and Shafie Salleh). Abdullah will in turn replace them with "his men" or politicians with a cleaner PR image.

On a related note, a handful of ACA officers has "visited" the MITI headquarters yesterday. According to The Sun, they were there for about a total of five hours visiting five different floors in the building. Interviews (or is it interrogations?) were carried out with senior staff of various department (including AP department). Even the MITI secretary-general and his deputy were not spared!

However, official ACA responses regarding the visit were in a state of confusion and opaque. ACA deputy DG has no comment stating grounds of confidentiality while FT ACA director officially denied the visit. All of this happened while Rafidah is on her "MC".

Come to think of it, if an ACA director can go on the record to deny the visit, I wonder who are those people who visited MITI and even interviewed those big-shots there? Was the director kept out of the loop? Was it conducted by the Special Branch on orders of Abdullah? Or was there a visit by ACA after all?

Where is the transparency in ACA??

All in all, Rafidah will be prepared (in her 18-pages report) to stage a big come back. She will be weighing the odds all day throughout her "MC" on whether to be discharged dishonorably or being thrown into the brig (maybe not on sodomy charges like Anwar but on corruptions, remember the 18 files that is still on Abdullah's table?).

More episodes (hopefully the conclusion) of the Rafidah saga is set to unveil in the coming weeks ahead.

Be prepared for surprises!