Nazir Razak questions delay in auditing 1MDB’s 2015 accounts
(The Malaysian Insider) – The prime minister’s brother Datuk Seri Nazir Razak said he was “perplexed” over Putrajaya’s slowness in auditing troubled 1Malaysia Development Berhad’s (1MDB) financial accounts for the current financial year.
In a posting on photo-sharing site Instagram, the prominent banker questioned if corporate governance on the Finance Ministry-owned state investment vehicle standards had dropped.
“I am perplexed why your March 2015 audit has not even started? How is this allowed? Has standards of GLC governance dropped so low?” he posted on his Instagram account.
Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) revealed two days ago that Putrajaya had yet to direct international auditor Deloitte to audit 1MDB’s 2015 accounts.
It last audited 1MDB’s books for the financial year ending March 31, 2014.
PAC yesterday said the delay in auditing the firm, which has chalked up RM42 billion in debts in just six years of operations, would pose a “hindrance” to its ongoing probe of 1MDB’s operations.
However, the embattled company’s president Arul Kanda Kandasamy dismissed claims that both the Finance Ministry and the company were stopping Deloitte from auditing its accounts for the current financial year.
“The board and management of 1MDB met Deloitte as early as February 2015 to discuss commencement of an audit after the financial year-end of 31 March 2015,” he said in a statement yesterday.
This is not the first time Nazir has criticised 1MDB, where his brother, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak chairs the advisory board.
Najib is also the finance minister.
Nazir had previously taken to his Instagram account to criticise Arul Kanda and former 1MDB chief executive officer Datuk Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi’s no-show at a scheduled PAC hearing.
“Your company has triggered a national crisis and you can be too busy to face Parliament? Unacceptable,” he had posted on his Instagram account last month over the two senior executives’ request for a 30-day extension before testifying to PAC, citing important overseas appointments.
