PERIKATAN Nasional (PN) candidate for the Kuala Kubu Baharu (KKB) state by-election Khairul Azhari Saut has found himself cornered over obscurity in his academic qualification.

This comes about as netizens raised doubts over his rather “express jump” from SPM to a diploma some 33 years later before obtaining an Executive Masters in Business Management within a span of two years at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In his election profile, the 54-year-old Hulu Selangor Bersatu acting division chief has stated that he obtained an Executive Diploma in Management from Universiti Malaya (UM) in 2019 after leaving SMK Felda Soeharto KKB prior to be conferred his Executive Master’s degree at the Universiti Malaysia Pahang (UMP) in 2021.

This has prompted political analyst Liyana Marzuki to describe Khairul’s curiculum vitae (CV) as “very impressive” for he was able to obtain his diploma at the age of 49 and within one year upon having completed his diploma, pursued his Executive Master’s degree.

“Imagine within two years he has settled his Master’s level. Mind you, this is during the MCO (movement control order) period,” she penned on the X platform.

“What is even more ‘amazing’ is that before obtaining his diploma, he was already the managing director of an O&G (oil & gas) company and even a financial executive of Bursa Malaysia. I never thought that I can become an executive at Bursa Malaysia with just s SPM certificate.

“To those who work with UM, UMP and Bursa Malaysia, please help us with fact-check. Is what is presented here true?

Fast forward to Khairul’s “no comment” response when swamped by the media over his academic status soon after yesterday’s (April 27) nomination day for the KKB by-election, Liyana described such move as “smart” instead of challenging “netizens to dig a deeper hole”.

“Hopefully after this, the Election Commission (EC) will come out with a law to ensure that election candidates don’t scam their qualifications,” reckoned the former special officer to former international trade and industry minister Darell Leiking.

“Even if you want to work in a factory, you have to possess a genuine SRP/ PMR certificate now. I don’t want to see people representatives simply take their electorate for a ride.”

Speaking from experience, Liyana shared an incident during the 15^th General Election (GE15) of a “medical doctor” candidate in Kelantan who went round the village to check run medical check on the electorate.

This was when a little bird who happened to be in the same university that he attended revealed that he actually did not complete his studies.

“When I did a due diligence and found out that his name is not in MMC (Malaysian Medical Council) list, I further enquired on Facebook,” recalled Liyana.

“This was when he jumped up and lodged numerous police reports against me. This is outrageously fraudulent as even the university in Indonesia which he studied in confirmed that he did not complete his studies. And that the certificate that he displayed was just fake”

After losing the election, he interestingly contacted Liyana, begging her “not to do anything”.

“I asked him to deal with my lawyer. He also said he could not withdraw the report because the police wanted to proceed with their investigation,” revealed the lawyer by qualification who is now an influencer on the subject of politics, democracy and counter-propaganda in the social media.

“I even asked the police from Kelantan to come to my house to collect all the available evidence. This is when he pleaded again not to continue for he risked being found guilty of falsifying his police report.

“Because he lost the election and he regretted his action, I told my lawyer to drop the case. Let him start a new life. There is wisdom there.” - April 28, 2024

https://focusmalaysia.my/why-cant-the-bersatu-by-election-candidate-for-kkb-just-be-truthful-transparent-about-his-academic-status/