The Malaysian Insight

FORMER prime minister Najib Razak genuinely believed that funds deposited in his personal bank accounts in 2014 were donations from the late Saudi ruler King Abdullah Abdul Aziz Al-Saud, his lawyers said during oral submissions of the SRC International trial today.

Najib faces seven criminal charges for receiving RM42 million in SRC International funds between December 2014 and February 2015.

He acknowledged in his testimony in December that the money was spent on political activities and corporate social responsibility programmes.

During oral submissions today, defence counsel Harvindejit Singh said his client held a bona fide, or genuine belief, that the money was part of further donations remitted to him by the Saudi royalty, as had been done annually for three years between 2011 and 2013.

Najib previously testified that a total of US$1.05 billion (RM3.2 billion then) from Saudi royalty was deposited into his personal AmBank account via Tanore Finance Corp.

Harvinderjit said Najib not only had no knowledge that RM42 million came from SRC International, but it could be inferred that Najib believed that the money was from Saudi Arabia as “there was intimation that further Arab donations would be made”.

He added Najib’s belief was reinforced by 1Malaysia Development Berhad intermediary Low Taek Jho’s influence with the Saudi family.

Harvinderjit said further inferences that the donations were real could be made from letters produced by Najib’s late private secretary Azlin Alias, written in mid-2014 by an emissary of King Abdullah that stated further donations, on top of the US$800 million made in early 2013, would be imminent.

Harvinderjit said it did not matter not whether the Arab donations were proven real, as the crux of the case is whether Najib believed that they were and acted in good faith.

“The prosecution are trying to make the argument that the Arab donations are not real at all. If my learned friends had proof it was not real, it would not be here.”

He said Najib’s belief was sustained given the circumstances relating to the donations and his accounts.

He also said the accused had no reasonable cause to suspect that the source of the funds in his accounts were not from donations made by the Saudi royalty or to take further steps to ascertain the source of the funds in his accounts.

Najib is charged with three counts of criminal breach of trust, three counts of money-laundering and one count of abuse of power. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years imprisonment.

Najib, who turns 67 next month, is represented by a dozen lawyers led by Muhammad Shafee Abdullah.

The trial is in its final stage, with both defence and prosecution presenting their oral submissions. Presiding judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali will later fix a date to deliver his verdict. – June 3, 2020.