Axed 1MDB investigators were offered $1 million each to go silent
KUALA LUMPUR Senior investigators who were axed in 2015 for pursuing mismanagement at Malaysian state fund 1MDB were offered at least RM3 million (S$1 million) each for their silence, sources said.
They told The Straits Times an MP from former ruling coalition Barisan Nasional was chosen to negotiate with the investigators in a bid to drop the probe.
"The MP is known for 'getting things done'" for top-level officials in the previous government, claimed one source.
"The MP personally brought a bag full of cash and offered it to my boss. But in exchange, my superior would have to abandon the case," he claimed.
"After all efforts to get him to accept the offer were declined, my boss was removed. The intense harassment and death threats began instantly."
Questions over who the MP was, and what had happened in the background, arose after new Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief Mohd Shukri Abdull told a news conference on Tuesday that an MP from a northern state had tried to bribe several officers to drop the 1MDB case.
Mr Shukri, recently reinstated at the MACC by the Pakatan Harapan government, said he received death threats and was harassed while probing the 1MDB scandal in 2015. He said: "An MP from the north who is known for the adage 'cash is king' came to see me twice to tell me to let the matter slide.
"... The second time, I told him he had better leave me alone or I'd arrest him."
A second source added: "...the MP went as far as hiring a group of gangsters from a neighbouring country to intimidate him and his whole family." - NADIRAH H. RODZI, MALAYSIA CORRESPONDENT
Get The New Paper on your phone with the free TNP app. Download from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store now
