KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 24 — Tan Sri Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah today criticised a minister for threatening to blacklist government-linked firms that finance the Bersih 5 rally, saying donations are fine as long as they are not for illegal purposes.

"I don’t think that’s right,” the veteran politician known as Ku Li told the media after launching a book on Umno here, repeating the phrase three times.

"People can donate, anybody can donate to any cause so long that it’s not against the law, against the Constitution.”

Yesterday, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan announced that government-linked companies found to be funding the Bersih 5 rally will be placed on a blacklist with immediate effect.

Abdul Rahman added that he will request the Economic Planning Unit and the Public Private Partnership Unit to scrutinise all companies that have requested contracts from the government, after the editors of Umno-linked broadsheet Mingguan Malaysia urged for stiff action to be taken against the electoral reforms pressure group.

The Umno MP also chided Special Affairs Department (Jasa) strategic communications director Tun Faisal Ismail Aziz for urging civil servants to quit if they do not support the ruling party, insisting that expressing one’s affiliations is part of democracy.

"They have their right to exercise their freedom. This is a democracy,” he said.

Bersih 5, the latest rally calling for free and clean elections, will be held nationwide on November 19.