COMMENT | As US and British soldiers moved into Iraq during the war in April 2003, Saddam Hussein’s faithful minister of information, Mohammad Said Sahhaf, kept the world entertained with his statements on the state of the war.

He earned the monikers Comical Ali and Baghdad Bob for his wild claims and colourful verses made while Iraq was being invaded and overrun.

Sahhaf’s infamous quotes included: “Now even the American command is under siege. We are hitting it from the north, east, south and west. We chase them here and they chase us there. But in the end, we are the people who are laying siege to them. And it is not them who are besieging us.

“I can say, and I am responsible for what I am saying, that they have started to commit suicide under the walls of Baghdad. We will encourage them to commit more suicides quickly.

“God will roast their stomachs in hell at the hands of Iraqis.”

Looking back, Malaysia too had its fair share of Comical Alis and Kuala Lumpur Bobs after the Asian Wall Street Journal reported in 2015 that 1MDB funds had ended up in Najib Razak’s bank account...