Tengku Zafrul dismisses resignation rumour

In a posting on his Facebook page, he explained that his absence from the parliamentary sitting was due to a personal emergency.

"I had informed them of this matter yesterday. I had no intention of not fulfilling my responsibility to answer questions as Finance Minister, '' he said, referring to a report by a local media asking if he had resigned from his post.

The report was written in relation to the tabling of the Supplementary Supply Bill 2021 (2022) by Deputy Finance Minister I, Datuk Mohd Shahar Abdullah today.

"Last year, it (the bill) was also tabled by the Deputy Finance Minister. The media could have just checked with my office or my officer," said Tengku Zafrul.

He appealed for the media not to gossip and to be fair in their reports, adding that this was not the first time that a minister was asked to read the answer from another minister.

This morning, the Dewan Rakyat was all atwitter when Tengku Zafrul's reply during the Minister's Question Time (MQT) session was read by Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Religious Affairs), Datuk Idris Ahmad.

In his Facebook post, the Finance Minister clarified that according to the standard operating procedure, only a minister can reply during the MQT, and thanked the Religious Affairs Minister for reading his reply.