KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 14 — Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak had claimed that the funds totalling more than RM2 billion which entered his personal AmIslamic bank accounts were donations from Arabs, but investigations showed that the money actually came from Malaysian fugitive Low Taek Jho’s proxy’s company, the High Court heard today.
Assistant Commissioner of Police Foo Wei Min said this while testifying as the 48th witness in Najib’s trial, where the latter is facing money laundering charges over more than RM2 billion of 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) funds alleged to have entered his private bank accounts.
This afternoon, Najib’s lead defence lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah said his client had never once shifted his ground and had always said “that he always believed the money he received in his account came from donation”.
Foo confirmed this was mentioned to him when he was recording Najib’s statement during the police’s money laundering investigation, saying: “I was told by Datuk Seri Najib in the statement that the money that he received from the Arabs are for the donation.”
Shafee then added: “And then he also said that all the money that he received, the big money he received, including from Tanore, he thought they were also from Arab donation, but through a different arm that came in.”
But Foo said: “He told me that, however, the investigation showed otherwise, because Tanore does not belong to any Arabs. Tanore belongs to an individual called Eric Tan Kim Loong, who is a proxy of Jho Low. And before Tanore, Eric Tan Kim Loong also has several bank accounts which he opened to receive 1MDB GIL’s money to pay for lots of luxurious things.”
Foo was referring to Tanore Finance Corp, a company which was alleged to have channelled RM2.081 billion of illegal money — originally belonging to 1MDB subsidiary 1MDB Global Investments Limited (1MDB GIL) — into Najib’s AmIslamic bank account codenamed “AmPrivate Banking-MR”.
Based on the statement recorded during Foo’s investigations, Shafee highlighted that Najib had said he did not know about the funds that entered his account and that he had considered all funds received to be donations from Saudi Arabia. From the statement, Najib also said that he did not know who owns Tanore’s bank account in Falcon Private Bank, Singapore.
Foo said investigations on Tanore proved that the company belongs to Tan instead of to Arabs, and that he had first discovered this after looking at Tanore’s bank account opening documents and its bank statement.
Foo said he had not interviewed Tan as the latter had absconded from Malaysia, and said he did not interview any royalty in Saudi Arabia related to this case as “they were not willing to be interviewed”.
Foo said he was told by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) that it did interview and take down statements from “the Arabs”, but said he is uncertain about when the interviews were conducted and who were interviewed and the contents of the interview.
Foo said Najib had given him four documents — which are the four purported letters from an alleged Saudi prince promising huge sums of money to Najib as gifts, adding: “But I’m not sure the genuineness of those documents.”
Foo said the four donation letters that Najib gave were photocopied versions, adding that the police was unable to verify these documents: “We try to investigate, we try to get the Arabs to confirm it, but the Arabs have denied access to the Arabs, that’s why we can’t.”
Foo said the police were unable to have access to the Arabs and to record their statements, as the MACC had carried out an investigation on the matter.
The four purported letters addressed to Najib were signed off by the alleged Saudi prince — alternately as “Saud Abdulaziz AL-Saud”, “HRH Prince Saud Abdulaziz Al-Saud”, and “Saud Abdulaziz Al Saud”. The four letters were dated February 1, 2011 with a promised gift of US$100 million, November 1, 2011 (US$375 million), March 1, 2013 (US$800 million) and June 1, 2014 (£50 million).
These four letters were previously produced in this 1MDB trial by Najib’s lawyers in the form of photocopied versions of the documents.
But the prosecution had previously in December 2022 insisted that Najib will not be able to use these four letters to defend himself over the RM2.27 billion as other courts had found the letters to be a fabrication.
Among other things, Foo said Najib did say during investigations that Low — otherwise known as Jho Low — is close to the Arabs and that he had witnessed Low’s connection with the Saudi, but noted that Najib’s comments are subject to being proven.
While Najib had during investigations said that Low had told him that he had a close relationship with the late Saudi ruler King Abdullah’s family and to the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates, Foo said this was beyond his scope of investigation which was focused on the alleged money laundering offences in Najib’s 1MDB case.
In relation to other transactions in 2011 in Najib’s account which were purportedly donations from Arab, Foo said this was still subject to investigation and that investigators “found out that there’s no proof of the donation” as the money trail showed that the money came from 1MDB during the first phase of the 1MDB scheme known as the “Good Star phase”.
Foo confirmed that Najib did mention he had opened his AmIslamic bank account to receive anticipated donations from Arabs.
Najib’s 1MDB trial before judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah resumes tomorrow, with Shafee expected to further cross-examine Foo.
