KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 1 — Charitable foundation Yayasan Akalbudi’s cheques were issued in the past to pay off Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s personal credit card as this was used to purchase items for donation, his former secretary told the High Court today.
Datuk Rosiah Osman, who served as Zahid’s secretary from January 1994 until her mandatory retirement in December 2011, said this while testifying in Zahid’s corruption and criminal breach of trust trial involving RM31 million from Yayasan Akalbudi as well as further millions of alleged bribes.
Testifying as the seventh defence witness in Zahid’s favour, Rosiah said she was working at Kretam Holdings Berhad as Zahid’s personal secretary, before following Zahid later to Syarikat Perumahan Negara, the Tourism Ministry, the Communications and Multimedia Ministry, the Prime Minister’s Department, and the Defence Ministry.
In her former role as both Zahid’s executive secretary and personal secretary, Rosiah said she handled all of Zahid’s personal matters including payments for his personal expenses and bills using cheques or cash, his credit card bills, road tax, and vehicle insurance policies, as well as his daily and monthly schedule.
Rosiah said Zahid also asked for her help to handle the finances for Yayasan Akalbudi which was set up by Zahid, confirming that she held both the cheque books for Yayasan Akalbudi’s Affin Bank account and for Zahid’s personal Maybank account.
Rosiah said she would first identify whether credit card statements or bills were for Zahid’s personal matters or for donation, before deciding whether to use Zahid’s personal cheque book or Yayasan Akalbudi’s cheque book to prepare cheques for Zahid to sign.
While saying she would use Zahid’s cheque from his personal Maybank account to pay for his personal matters, Rosiah said there were times where she issued Yayasan Akalbudi’s cheques to pay for Zahid’s credit card bills to reimburse him for donated items.
“For Yayasan Akalbudi, we determine whether spending was used for donations, I will reimburse it back, we will use cheque to pay the credit card,” the 71-year-old retiree told Zahid’s lawyer Hamidi Mohd Noh.
She said Yayasan Akalbudi does not have credit cards and that Zahid’s personal credit cards would occasionally be used to buy items to be donated to mosques.
“Sometimes, Yang Arif, like buying air-conditioner for mosques, there are also requests that ask Datuk Seri to contribute carpet, or air-conditioner, or fans for mosque, that is contribution,” she said.
Rosiah confirmed today that she previously used a stamp with an exact replica of Zahid’s signature, adding that this signature stamp was produced as there were times when Zahid would have to sign in bulk for items such as certificates of appreciation, invitation cards or festive greeting cards and as it would be very tiring to physically sign them one by one.
Rosiah said greeting cards could be in the range of thousands, while there were usually around 300 to 400 certificates of appreciation which needed to be signed depending on the number of participants of an event.
She agreed it would be illogical for those items to be signed one by one.
Rosiah said she kept this signature stamp of Zahid’s along with other stamps in a locked metal cabinet that only she had access to, adding that she then handed over all these stamps and cheque books for both Zahid’s and Yayasan Akalbudi’s account to her successor Major Mazlina Mazlan @ Ramly in December 2011.
Hamidi today showed 32 Yayasan Akalbudi cheques to Rosiah, which she identified as all bearing the stamped signature of Zahid’s instead of his handwritten signature.
She said these Yayasan Akalbudi cheques were issued in 2014 and 2015 and attributed them as being issued by Mazlina, saying that the use of Zahid’s stamped signature on the cheques should not have happened and said banks should not approve such cheques with stamped signatures.
Rosiah said she herself never used Zahid’s stamped signature for purposes other than the greeting cards, invitation cards and certificates of appreciation, later saying: “Datuk Zahid never gave orders to use the ‘chop’ for cheques.”
Rosiah said she did brief Mazlina when handing over the cheque books and the signature stamp, saying that she told the latter to use Zahid’s personal cheques for personal matters, Yayasan Akalbudi’s cheques for donations and the Zahid signature stamp for office matters such as certificates and not for cheques.
Rosiah said she did not have any access to Zahid’s finances after her retirement and after she handed over the signature stamp to Mazlina, confirming that the latter did not deal with her and did not ask her for advice or help on any banking matters.
Throughout the trial, Zahid’s lawyers have sought to pin the blame on Mazlina for matters such as the use of Yayasan Akalbudi’s cheques to pay for Zahid’s and his wife’s credit card bills, while the prosecution had previously argued against turning Mazlina into a scapegoat and argued that Zahid should be held responsible.
Zahid, who is also Umno president and Barisan Nasional chairman, is facing 47 charges in this trial.
The 47 charges are namely, 12 counts of criminal breach of trust in relation to over RM31 million of charitable foundation Yayasan Akalbudi’s funds, 27 counts of money laundering, and eight counts of bribery charges of over RM21.25 million in alleged bribes.
Yayasan Akalbudi was founded with the purported objectives of receiving and administering funds for the eradication of poverty and enhancing the welfare of the poor.
Zahid’s trial before judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah resumes tomorrow, with Hamidi expected to continue cross-examining Rosiah.
