PUTRAJAYA, March 12 — 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) CEO Datuk Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi had previously told the police that he had treated whatever Low Taek Jho told him as having originated from then prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, a former senior investigator from the police told the High Court today.
Senior Assistant Commissioner Rajagopal Ramadhass — who had investigated a December 2014 police report on alleged criminal breach of trust of 1MDB funds — said this while testifying as the 11th defence witness in Najib’s 1MDB trial.
Telling the High Court what Shahrol had said during police investigations on the 1MDB case, Rajagopal said: “So he said anything that Jho Low told him, he said that came from Datuk Seri Najib.”
Before summing up Shahrol’s conclusion, Rajagopal noted that the whole project involving 1MDB’s US$1 billion deal with purported partner PetroSaudi International (PSI) Ltd had seen Low being involved in discussions relating to the matter with Shahrol and that Low had also met with Najib.
Rajagopal was replying to Najib’s lead defence lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah’s question on whether Shahrol had claimed to the police that Low is the “mirror image” of Najib.
Shafee later clarified what Shahrol had said in investigations on 1MDB and PSI’s US$1 billion joint venture deal: “Shahrol mentioned to you in his statement that he thought whatever Jho Low says would have come from the prime minister?”
Rajagopal confirmed that this was what Shahrol had said.
Rajagopal said Shahrol did meet with Najib — who was also chairman of 1MDB’s board of advisers — to give the latter briefings and bring 1MDB documents for him to sign.
But when asked if Shahrol had checked with Najib on each representation made by Low and which he thought must have originated from the then prime minister, Rajagopal said Shahrol had not checked with Najib on specific transactions involving money transfers.
Previously, Shahrol as the prosecution’s ninth witness in the 1MDB trial said that 1MDB had received “nothing” and not even “a penny” back from its US$1 billion investment in its 2009 joint venture deal.
The US$1 billion which 1MDB had borrowed was supposed to go to the joint venture company 1MDB PetroSaudi Limited’s BSI bank account.
But the US$1 billion was split and sent out as two separate sums of US$300 million to the joint venture company’s JP Morgan bank account and as US$700 million to Good Star Limited.
Good Star is now known to be Low’s company.
The prosecution had on Day One of Najib’s 1MDB trial in 2019 said it will show that US$20 million of the US$700 million sent to Good Star eventually ended up in Najib’s personal bank account, and that Low was Najib’s mirror image.
Najib is accused of having received more than RM2 billion of funds belonging to 1MDB in his personal AmIslamic bank accounts, but he has claimed that the huge sums of money which entered his accounts were donations from Saudi Arabia’s royalty.
The 1MDB trial before trial judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah resumes tomorrow, with Najib’s lawyers to continue asking questions to Rajagopal.
