In a statement, Gerak also questioned the council’s validity, adding that “many” did not see the purpose of providing MPN with millions of ringgit in funds.

“It is time to let MPN go, this time without parking it under any ministry or government office.

“These professors are financially equipped and wise enough to take care of themselves without expensive taxpayers’ crutches to hold them and their breeches up.”

Gerak was referring to 2018, when MPN was disbanded as a government-funded organisation only to be placed under the purview of the Prime Minister’s Office and subsequently funded during Ismail Sabri Yaakob’s administration.

The recent auditor-general’s report revealed that two MPN trustees had misused RM373,516 of the council’s funds to finance the operations of two companies in which they held shares.

The report also highlighted a conflict of interest as the trustee members had failed to declare their interests as shareholders in the two companies in accordance with the Companies Act 2016.

Two days ago, Tebrau MP Jimmy Puah of PKR called for the government to disband MPN, saying this would save public funds which could be directly spent on the people through aid programmes.

Gerak meanwhile asked how MPN had been providing solutions to socio-cultural crises and demanded proof of its positive contribution to the nation’s “material, psychological, and spiritual development”.

It also asked if MPN had created a sense of identity and patriotism, and whether it had offered constructive criticism of the state.

Gerak said that without clear evidence, MPN appeared to be merely a hierarchical entity.

“It tags itself as the nation’s thinkers but has little or nothing to do with national thinking, and neither is it a bastion of contributing intellectuals for nation-building,” it said.