A Morais in hand is worth USD5 million in Clare Brown’s books
“Basser himself earned USD200,000 just by anchoring that one episode, while Ms. Rewcasle chalked up USD2 million by performing the part of ‘dejected journalist’. Now, we’re talking USD14.2 million here, money that turned the 28th of March 2016 episode into one of the “most expensive pieces of political crap ever aired” – or so says my intel – in modern day television history”
THE THIRD FORCE
On the 26th of November 2015, a Statutory Declaration (SD) signed by a Charles Morais surfaced online amid allegations that his brother, the late Anthony Kevin Morais, furnished both Sarawak Report and Asia Sentinel with classified reports by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC). Months later, on the 28th of March 2016, Clare Rewcastle Brown told ABC’s Four Corners (WATCH HERE) that the state of affairs in Malaysia had reached pathological proportions.
“To have a prominent public legal figure snatched from the streets and brutally murdered in such a way…it’s perhaps a demonstration of what Malaysia is really like…it’s bizarre, terrifying what happened to Kevin.”
The Sarawak Report Chief Editor was referring to the murder of Anthony Kevin Morais, who, on the 4th of September 2015, was abducted from downtown Kuala Lumpur while on his way to work. Twelve days later, the body of the Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) was found stuffed in an oil drum filled with concrete in a swamp near USJ1, Subang Jaya.
The same position was taken by Charles, who told Four Corners that his brother’s murder was an “orchestrated attack to silence him.” The seemingly distraught Morais pointed to “extremely high level government authorities” as being responsible, adding that Kevin confided in him of a “high profile case” he was working on that concerned “terrible people.” When asked by journalist Linton Basser who Kevin was referring to, Charles had this to say:
“He was referring to Najib.”
At the time the documentary was released, Dato’ Seri NajibTun Razak was the central figure in probes involving several statutory agencies, among them being the MACC, the Royal Malaysian Police (PDRM), Bank Negara (BNM) and the Attorney General’s Chambers (AGC). These probes were triggered by a Special Task Force (STF) put together by the then Attorney General (AG) of Malaysia, Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail.
On the 2nd of November 2017, Lim Sian See correctly pointed out that Kevin was no longer with the MACC at the time probes commenced. The blogger further noted that the DPP had never attended STF meetings chaired by Gani that pertained 1MDB or any of its attendant concerns. In other words, Kevin was not at any point involved in probes relating to 1MDB or the preparation of a charge sheet deriving therefrom.
But Charles claimed differently.
According to him, the late DPP helped “prepare charge sheets against Prime Minister Najib Razak” that alleged the Prime Minister “corruptly obtained a bribe totaling RM27 million – the equivalent of eleven million Australian dollars – in return for organizing a loan for a government linked company.” When Basser turned to Ms. Rewcastle and asked how important the charge sheet was, she had this to say:
“This charge sheet was the smoking gun.”
Not much of one though, especially when you consider how the document was without a letterhead or even an official stamp. But the Sarawak Report Chief Editor claimed that “the Najib administration went wild” when she made it public. According to her, the Prime Minister “knew how dangerous it was,” a notion seemingly concurred to by Basser, who added that the charge sheet had the potential of destroying Najib’s career.
But there is a lot Basser kept from us.
For instance, the ABC journalist made no mention of the millions his producers were paid for that one episode implicating Najib of murder. While a chunk of that money was arranged by a third-party group led by Abbas ‘Eddy’ Farouq, the instruction to have it funneled to ABC was given by a former Malaysian premier, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad. Mahathir himself arranged the transfer of an additional USD2 million, bringing the total Basser’s bosses received to a ridiculous USD5 million.
