Nazri: RPK's claim over PI Bala needs to be probed

The federal government will probe blogger Raja Petra Kamaruddin’s claim that there was an elaborate plot centred around former private investigator P Balasubramaniam to discredit Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak. 

De facto law minister Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz said the allegation by Raja Petra was very serious and it will affect the credibility of the criminal justice system. 

“The allegation needs to be investigated.. We need to see what can be uncovered so the public can make a conclusion,” said Nazri according to Mingguan Malaysia - the weekend edition of Utusan Malaysia. 

He said that Raja Petra had the right to be heard, but declined comment on the veracity of the claims, stressing that investigations had to be conducted first. 

Yesterday, Utusan reported excerpts of Raja Petra’s blog posting which recounted his first meeting with Balasubramaniam on July 2, 2008 where the latter was preparing for his press conference, to be held on the following day, which featured allegations that Najib had links with slain Mongolian national Altantuya Shaariibuu. 

According to Raja Petra, Balasubramaniam had boasted about doing bad deeds during his days as a policeman and that his allegations against Najib in his first statutory declaration were “the truth”. 

Third SD?

Balasubramaniam would later claim that he made a dramatic U-turn the following day through a second statutory declaration to rescind the contents of his first statutory declaration out of fear and a promise of RM5 million by some people linked to Umno.

He would later claim that only RM700,000 was paid in installments and this led to opposition figures arranging for RM20,000 to banked into his account monthly. 

Raja Petra also accused Balasubramaniam of secretly negotiating with a prominent Umno leader for a passage home, along with the balance of the RM5 million.

In return, Raja Petra alleged that the Umno leader wanted Balasubramaniam to make a third statutory declaration to implicate Anwar and some PKR leaders. 

The blogger claimed that this deal fell flat, but Utusan never mentioned the allegations concerning the Umno leader.