My sixth tranche of questions for the Minister for Communications and Multimedia, Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak to help him reinstate his right to ask questions and demand answers from others, after forfeiting such right when as Minister responsible for the portfolio of information, he failed to answer numerous questions about government scandals and failings, are as follows:

Question 26:

Yesterday, the Finance Minister II Datuk Johari Abdul Gani yesterday said it was “good news” for the conviction of the third former BSI Singapore banker Yeo Jiawei on witness-tampering charges in relation to Singapore’s investigations into the 1MDB money trail, which has resulted in Yeo’s 30 month prison sentence.

Yeo is to stand trial next year for another seven charges including money-laundering, cheating and forgery in the illicit movement of S$23.9 million (US$16.54 or RM74 million) of 1MDB-linked funds.

Is Johari’s “welcome” statement an indication that the Malaysian Government has woken up from its charade and realised that the Malaysian government cannot continue to pretend that the global 1MDB kleptocratic scandal is no problem at all in Malaysia when criminal investigations and prosecutions connected with 1MDB are taking place in some 10 countries?

If so, what is the government’s next step to restore national and international confidence in the Malaysian government by coming to grips with the international 1MBD money-laundering scandal? Read the rest of this entry »

By NATHANIEL POPPER and MATTHEW GOLDSTEIN
New York Times
DEC. 22, 2016

Even as Goldman Sachs is gaining a more prominent profile in the administration of Donald J. Trump, the Wall Street investment firm is undergoing scrutiny in an investigation in a sprawling international money laundering and embezzlement scheme.

Prosecutors have said that billions of dollars that Goldman raised for a Malaysian government investment fund — known as 1Malaysia Development Berhad, or 1MDB — were channeled into a web of personal bank accounts and was ultimately used to buy paintings, luxury real estate and investment stakes in movies like “The Wolf of Wall Street.”

Investigators are now questioning what Goldman knew about the final use of the money.

Goldman has said it believed the money was being used to buy legitimate assets for the investment fund, which was run in part by the Malaysian government and its embattled prime minister, Najib Razak. Read the rest of this entry »

In a week’s time, 2016 is ending as an even worse annus horribilis for Malaysia than 2015.

Malaysians were shocked when at the end of last year, Malaysia was named among the world’s six “worst corruption scandals of 2015” by the international website, foreignpolicy.com, which is published daily online by the Slate Group, a division of Washington Post Company.

Malaysia was in the dishonourable third place, as the first two “worst corruption scandals of 2015” went to corruption in the world’s soccer industry involving FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association) and Nigeria. The fourth to sixth places went to Honduras and Guatemala, Ghanian judges and the UN General Assembly.

The infamous plaque of dishonour for Malaysia cited as follows:

“When U.S. President Barack Obama visited Malaysia in November, he had the pleasure of arriving in the middle of an awkward corruption scandal. Four months earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that some $700 million of state funds had ended up in Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s personal bank account — which was not where they were supposed to go. That tied Razak directly to a probe into the 1Malaysia Development Berhad, a government-owned development company that was supposed to turn Kuala Lumpur into a thriving financial hub. Najib has disparaged the Journal’s reports as inaccurate, claiming instead that the money in his account came from personal donations. But the reports came after the fund had already fallen behind on its payment schedule. Obama claims he raised the question of corruption in a private meeting with Najib, but publicly said only that the government should aim to be ‘more accountable, more open, more transparent, to root out corruption’.”

Read the rest of this entry »

By JUSTIN BAER, TOM WRIGHT and KEN BROWN
Wall Street Journal
Dec. 22, 2016

Bank courted state fund now at heart of global embezzlement probes, and investigators want to know if it should have reported suspicious activity

On a yacht moored at Saint-Tropez, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak talked business with Abu Dhabi’s crown prince. Included in the horseshoe of chairs set up for the July 2013 gathering was a partner from Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

The bank earned its place through years of cultivating Mr. Najib and a state investment fund he founded. Goldman had raised $6.5 billion for the fund and earned nearly $600 million in fees, making the Malaysian client among its most lucrative.

Mr. Najib lavished praise on Goldman, said people familiar with the meeting. “Do you see any other bankers on this boat?” one recalls him saying.

Today Mr. Najib and the state fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd., or 1MDB, are at the center of what investigators consider one of the largest financial frauds in history. Investigators have said 1MDB was used by the prime minister as a political slush fund and by associates of his to buy more than $1 billion of real estate, art and other luxuries from London to Beverly Hills, Calif. Read the rest of this entry »