SHAH ALAM, Aug 27 — Rafizi Ramli today told the press that he had known about the littoral combat ship (LCS) scandal for months before it entered the public domain.

Rafizi, who is also PKR deputy president, said that he did not reveal knowledge of the scandal beforehand because he needed time to gather and study all the relevant information.

He added that the Public Accounts Committee’s (PAC) revelation on the scandal in Parliament was just a mere coincidence that he jumped upon.

“I admit that I have known about the LCS issue for several months, about four to five months, and I studied it for a few months. So, when the PAC coincidently revealed the issue, it was on other aspects of the case.

“There is a lot more garbage in this scandal that has yet to be uncovered. I feel that if elections were to happen in two months, this LCS issue will still be going on,” he told reporters during a press conference after PKR’s Election Convention here.

He also stressed that he is not the type of person to bring up issues for politics’ sake, but something that he enjoys doing as a pastime.

“It’s like being Detective Conan; investigating has also been something I liked doing. I wanted to be a cop, but that didn’t happen.

“But I think LCS will be a big issue that will remain that way until voting day,” he said.

Detective Conan is the eponymous hero of a popular Japanese sleuth manga series written and illustrated by Gosho Aoyama.

Malaysia’s latest financial scandal — the RM9 billion littoral combat ships (LCS) procurement deal — took a turn recently when Rafizi revealed that the involvement of a woman named Zainab Mohd Salleh, who he alleged was Minister in the Prime Minister Department (Special Functions) Datuk Dr Abdul Latiff Ahmad’s wife.

Rafizi first alleged that Zainab was the second wife of Dr Abdul Latiff yesterday.

He claimed she was the owner of Alizes Marine Ltd and that the company was also named in the Panama Papers as well as the Paradise Papers, two controversial lists that were supposedly leaked and detailed how offshore companies were hiding money gained from illicit activities around the world.

Dr Abdul Latiff was deputy defence minister from 2008 to 2013.

The Bersatu politician has denied that the Zainab reported in the media as linked to the LCS scandal is his second wife, and challenged Rafizi to provide evidence that the woman in question was one of his wives.