An uproar ensued in the lower house of the Malaysian parliament on March 26 when Members of Parliament (MPs) exchanged words following a disagreement on the state of the country's finances.

Lim questioned on government debt

Former prime minister Najib Razak first questioned finance minister Lim Guan Eng on the government's debt, The Edge Markets reported.

According to data from the Central Bank of Malaysia, the debt rose by RM87.1 billion (S$28.9 billion) to the current RM773.1 billion (S$256.5 billion).

In response, Lim said the government has not had any new major projects since they took over in May 2018, and that any loans made were due to development projects approved earlier under Budget 2018, reported Malaysiakini.

Lim added that the government had to follow the Budget 2018 that was approved in the previous year.

Lim claimed 1MDB debt was hidden

The situation became tense when Lim claimed the debt amount was contributed by the debts of sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) that was set up by Najib in 2009.

Lim said the previous administration had tried to conceal the 1MDB debt by omitting it from the official figures of the government's debt.

He also stated that the current government is "forced to make payments despite not being the main guarantor".

Opposition strikes back

In response, Najib told Lim to stop talking about 1MDB and to "manage the country properly", reported The Star Online.

Former Minister for Youth and Sports Khairy Jamaluddin also chimed in, reminding Lim that not all of the alleged RM1 trillion debt is connected to 1MDB and implying that Lim was making it seem as though the nation's entire debt was linked to it.

Lim, however, maintained that it was Najib who put the country in such a dire financial situation.

This quickly resulted in a shouting match between the Pakatan Harapan and Barisan Nasional (BN) members.

Deputy Speaker forced to step in

Deputy Speaker Nga Kor Ming was forced to step in and call for order in the House.

But the squabble did not end there.

Lim later asked Najib to clarify a recent allegation that the government had sold the Malaysian consulate building in Hong Kong via direct negotiation.

According to Free Malaysia Today (FMT), Najib did not directly respond to Lim's queries on that, asking Lim to address the "tunnel issue first".

Previously, there were allegations that several members of the Democratic Action Party (DAP) were involved in corruption when they received bribes from the contractor for the Penang undersea tunnel project.

Lim, however, had previously clarified that the project was awarded via an open tender.

"Bodoh"

Another shouting match subsequently broke out between BN and PH lawmakers when Penang Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow asked Lim:

"Do you agree that any parties who say the tunnel project was not done via open tender are bodoh (stupid)?"

For the rest of the session, both sides continued to exchange insults using the word "bodoh".

This resulted in the speaker of the lower house of parliament, Mohamad Arif Md Yusof, making a ruling to forbid the word.

Federal Territories Minister Khalid Samad, who is also MP for Shah Alam, Selangor, then said that while he would not use the word "bodoh", he might use the words "bukan cerdik" (not intelligent) instead.

Previously, in Malaysia Parliament:

Top image via KiniTV/YouTube