MACC targeted PKR politicians, says witness
(NST) – The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) had targeted its investigations on Parti Keadilan Rakyat politicians even before the commission started its full-scale probe on Aug 5 last year.
MACC’s star witness Mohd Imran Abdullah testified that the commission had focused on several PKR politicians and district councillors even before he was “employed” by the MACC to become their agent provocateur.
He became the agency’s agent provocateur on Aug 4 and served with MACC until Aug 19 last year.
He agreed with these facts after being shown a report lodged by MACC’s assistant enforcement officer Firdaus Idris on Aug 5 last year where Firdaus stated that he was opening an investigation against PKR politicians and the party’s local councillors.
“I agree that MACC’s Firdaus had already eyed PKR politicians and local councillors in an attempt to target them (for entrapment).
“He (Firdaus), had asked me to verify their involvement (in land dealings) starting with Ruslan Sahat when he first contacted me on Aug 4,” he said when cross-examined by counsel Surjan Singh, who is acting for former Perak Tengah district councillor Usaili Alias.
The 34-year-old car salesman, however, said Firdaus had required his services to find out how deeply Ruslan was involved in arranging land deals for development projects.
Ruslan, a former technician with the Perak State Development Corporation, died of heart attack on Aug 3. Charges against him have been dropped since his death.
“He (Firdaus) had suspicions about Ruslan’s involvement and had sought my assistance to confirm them. He asked me to contact Ruslan.
“He wanted to know whether the information he had in his hands was true.
“After talking to Ruslan, I found out that Firdaus’ suspicions were valid.
“I acted as an agent provocateur and followed Firdaus’ instructions without question in trapping the accused person.
“I did not act on my own… I merely followed instructions given to me.”
Imran, who earlier confirmed that he received RM100 per day for his services, however, denied that he had known of Firdaus’ intention at the onset of the investigation.
He said Firdaus did not tell him that PKR politicians or local councillors were involved with unscrupulous land dealings.
“He told me that there were politicians and local councillors who were involved in land dealings.
“No names were mentioned to me when I first spoke to Firdaus on Aug 4.
“He did not even mention about any misappropriation in Perak Tengah District Council (PTDC)… only that this was taking place in Perak and that Ruslan was the suspect in the matter,”he said, adding that it came as new knowledge to him that Firdaus had already targeted his investigation on land dealings in the PTDC.
Imran was testifying at the corruption trial of Jamaluddin Mohd Radzi (Independent-Behrang), Mohd Osman Mohd Jailu (Independent-Changkat Jering), Usaili, former Perak Tengah district councillor Zul Hassan and odd-job worker Fairul Azrim.
All five are charged with accepting bribes of between RM400 and RM100,000 between Aug 6 and Aug 19 last year, and sexual favours from women arranged by Imran as incentive to obtain a development project in Pusat Bandar Seri Iskandar, 45km south-west of here.
When asked if Firdaus had informed him of his (Firdaus’) report on Aug 5, Imran said he was not aware of the MACC report on the opening of the investigation, adding that Firdaus never told him to target any particular political individual.
Imran also admitted that he had put his signature on hand-written reports prepared by Firdaus and not on computer printed reports.
“He (Firdaus) was the one who prepared all the MACC reports that carried my signatures. I admit that none of the reports were based on my verbatim account,” he said, adding that the reports were prepared after discussions with Firdaus.
Hearing continues on Monday.
