KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 19 — Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng today described former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak as a confused person for not knowing the difference between University Islam Malaysia (UIM) and University Islam Antarabangsa (UIAM).

Najib had recently criticised Lim’s defence of a RM6 million allocation to New Era College, Southern University College and Han Chiang College.

Najib also questioned Lim’s comparison of those colleges to the RM15 million allocation to UIAM as nonsensical and pointed out that the three were private institutions while UIAM was a public university.

However, Lim said he never referred to UIAM and that the RM15 million was for UIM, which is also a private entity.

"It is regrettable that he (Najib) does not know the difference between UIM and UIAM although he had been in office for so long and served in Putrajaya for more than 20 years.

"It’s impossible for a former Prime Minister not to know about the existence of such a historic institution, or maybe he pretended not to know just to politicise the issue?” he said in a statement.

Guan Eng then questioned whether Najib read carefully his statement before making such allegations.

"Now who is the person that has been making ridiculous statement? Najib should apologise for his mistake but I’m sure he will not do that because he cannot do anything wrong,” he said.

Lim said this was similar to Najib’s insistence that he had not done any wrong in the 1MDB scandal.

"Even Goldman Sachs has apologised but Najib is still being stubborn and insists that he had not done anything wrong and refused to apologise,” he said.

Earlier this week Solomon apologised to Malaysians for former banker Tim Leissner’s role in the 1MDB scandal, but said the bank had conducted due diligence before every transaction.

Goldman is being investigated by Malaysian authorities and the US Department of Justice for its role as underwriter and arranger of three bond sales that raised US$6.5 billion for the sovereign wealth fund.

Najib had denied any wrongdoing or taking public funds for personal gain.