Cash for appointments claims ridiculous, says Khairy

(The Star) KUALA LUMPUR: Ridiculous! That's how Khairy Jamaluddin describes the allegations that people had to pay to get an appointment with him.

The Prime Minister's son-in-law said he had never employed “runners” to represent him to fix appointments in exchange for money.

“It's very easy to request for an appointment and in time you will get your appointment. There's no payment to be made for an appointment.

“It's ridiculous. Otherwise, I'd be charging people myself to meet me. It's stupid (to pay money for an appointment),” he told reporters at the Kongres Jihad Ekonomi (The Economic Struggle Congress) yesterday.

During the question-and-answer session, a participant, Mohammed Abdullah, who called himself a “failed businessman,” said he had been trying to meet the Umno Youth deputy chief for two years and one of his (Khairy's) runners had asked for RM150,000 to fix an appointment.

Khairy said he had no idea who the so-called runner was, adding that he had not received even a sen from the appointments.

When met by reporters, Khairy disclosed that a lot of people claimed to have easy access to him and “all that stuff.”

One guy, he said, had even falsely represented himself as his (Khairy's) representative wanting to do business.

“I threatened to take him to court. I always tell people if they have any information of people representing me, or any other politician for that matter, they must always take down their names and approach us so that we can take action,'' he added.