What is MACC’s endgame?

By Xavier Kong, Focus Malaysia

There has been a recent surge in the activity of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), with the most recent being the expectation that Sabah Chief Minister and Warisan founder Mohd Shafie Apdal will be questioned by the commission.

The questioning, according to sources, will be about the alleged abuse of RM1.5 bil meant for rural development, which saw Shafie arrested on Oct 19, 2017. The case alleged that he had siphoned RM1.5 bil between 2009 and 2015, when he was rural and regional development minister.

He was then cleared of charges on Aug 28, 2018, with then-legal affairs minister Liew Vui Keong noting the case is considered closed due to insufficient evidence for further action.

However, earlier today (June 9), Warisan deputy president Peter Anthony was called in by MACC to give his statement over the RM155 mil graft case involving a Rubber Industry Smallholders Development Authority (Risda) land deal in 2014. He was a businessman when the deal was made, and he is also a strong supporter of Shafie, being coined one of Shafie’s generals.

Another recent case is that of former minister Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman, where he was probed by MACC following a police report he lodged on March 29 about over RM250,000 being missing from his home.

This led to Syed Saddiq revealing that there is no need for a minister to turn to bribery, due to “high pay, high allowance, and that is not even including the one-off payments received.” MACC had ordered him to declare his assets as part of the probe into the missing money, with the case being investigated for gratification and bribery.

However, this then led to Bersatu Youth leaders being arrested and called in for questioning, such as Siti Nurul Hidayah, secretary of the Youth Power Club and Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman’s aide.

This has also led to allegations that MACC had interrogated her as a suspect, instead of her being a witness offering her statement, with threats and harsh words used, with no access to her lawyer. However, MACC has firmly denied this, stating that there were two female officers with her throughout the process of recording her statement.

Following that, MACC also seized RM600,000 in cash from two Bersatu Youth members, with the amount believed to have been misappropriated from the party.

Yet another case being investigated is the case of former minister Lim Guan Eng and former attorney-general Tan Sri Tommy Thomas, where PAS Penang had lodged a report with MACC against the duo over an alleged move to unfreeze a tycoon’s bank accounts linked to the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) fiasco.

PAS Penang believes that Lim had “used his position, power, and influence” to get the former AG to issue an order to MACC, unfreezing the tycoon’s bank accounts. However, Lim has stepped forward, saying that he had merely referred the matter to the AG’s chambers, because it was not within his jurisdiction.

This began when, on June 1, documents were sighted by Free Malaysia Today that had Lim asking the Attorney-General’s Chambers to lift restrictions on a property developer’s bank accounts, which had been frozen to facilitate an investigation into money laundering, with a positive response logged from Thomas, who then ordered MACC to unfreeze the bank accounts.

Another ongoing investigation is that of a former senior management and board member of Perbadanan Usahawan Nasional Bhd (PUNB), for the abusing and misappropriation of funds that run into millions of ringgit, that was used for the acquisition of several companies, as well as contracts, loans and the sale of properties.

One of the contracts includes the purchase of 20,000 copies of a book about former prime minister Najib Razak, which was worth RM400,000. This has been in investigation since mid-2018, when MACC had raided PUNB headquarters in connection with the publication of Najib’s memoir.

One more investigation of note is where MACC is looking into an alleged 2014 land grab case in Sabah, which is still in the process of a court appeal. The case involved Sabah PKR chief Christina Liew and two others, with the Tawau High Court ruling that the trio had unlawfully induced a group of smallholders to breach their joint-venture agreement with Borneo Samudera, a subsidiary of state-owned Sawit Kinabalu.

The trio were ordered to pay RM577 mil in damages to Borneo Samudera, and the Federal Court had, in February 2020, dismissed Liew’s application to introduce fresh evidence against the High Court decision. The appeal is currently set for June 16.

However, MACC officers have responded that they are only trying to get information from the shareholders, with no cases opened as of yet.

With all of these cases being handled by MACC, just what is the endgame for the commission, especially with the cases forming a pattern generally involving opposition leaders, save for its investigation into PUNB?