The Malaysian Insight

FORMER Felda Investment Corporation (FIC) chief executive officer Mohd Zaid Abdul Jalil’s remand order was extended today to facilitate the probe into the purchase of a four-star London hotel.

He arrived at the court in Putrajaya at 9am, and was wheeled into the courtroom due to medical complications.

Magistrate Muhamad Safuan Azhar granted the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) a remand extension of four days instead of the seven requested.

The remand order ends on August 8.

A lawyer and his legal assistant, who were detained by MACC yesterday to facilitate the same investigation, have been remanded for five days.

FIC bought the high-end property in Kensington, London, between 2013 and 2015 for £60 million (RM330 million), said to be an inflated price.

Bernama reported that MACC chief commissioner Dzulkifli Ahmad had ordered an investigation paper to be opened on the case.

Meanwhile, three people, including a hotel owner, who had been remanded to faciliate the commission’s probe into FIC’s 2014 purchase of a hotel in Kuching, were released on a RM200,000 bail today.

The 57 year-old hotel owner was detained at the MACC office in Kuching, while the other two, at the agency’s headquarters in Putrajaya, over the weekend.

It is believed that FIC, the investment arm of Felda, had also paid more than the market value of the Kuching property, resulting in it incurring losses of millions of ringgit for both hotel buys.

Dzulkifli, in a talk-show programme aired on TV3 on Wednesday, said the investigation into FIC’s hotel purchases was 60% complete.

He said more time was needed as an overseas property was involved. – August 4, 2017.