In a Facebook post, the former prime minister admitted being “uneasy” over such attacks and questioned Putrajaya’s recent decision to publicise confidential letters by the PAS-led administration to the federal government.

Earlier this week, Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng revealed a letter from the Kelantan government in which it requested for a RM97 million advance. The ministry, however, only approved RM22.5 million.

Lim, who is also the DAP secretary-general, did so in response to criticisms of his claim that the east coast state had no money to pay its civil servants.

This morning, DAP’s Steven Sim revealed that Kelantan could only manage to repay Putrajaya RM3.94 million in 2016 despite owing RM395.83 million to the federal government.

In a press statement, Sim, who is also the deputy youth and sports minister, said Kelantan faced a deficit from 2012 to 2016, which came to a total of RM1.1 billion.

Najib pointed out that Lim had recently said that Penang managed to reduce its debts by 90% due to financial aid, including a RM1.3 billion grant for the Mengkuang dam that the previous Barisan Nasional administration had given it.

“But did the BN government mock Penang at that time and ask why the state, which is considered to be developed and wealthy, could not provide its own water supply?

“So what is the need to insult the Kelantan government which needed money to pay its civil servants, especially after it was struck by massive floods in 2014?”

Najib said while it could not be denied that Kelantan was among the poorest states then, it was due to the policies of the BN government — which was then under Dr Mahathir Mohamad — who halted development projects after PAS took over the state in 1990.

And this affected Kelantan’s revenue.

Najib added that when he was the prime minister, he set aside a huge allocation to help develop Kelantan.

“States that are less developed should be assisted a lot more by the federal government, not mocked.”