WARNING BELLS RING FOR NAJIB & ROSMAH: THEFT IN THE HOUSE OF SRC - DIALLING 999

1MDB’s fraud and its money trail are pretty clear by now; in broad outline: where had money come from, how much, when, where to, the fraudsters involved, and how it ended up where it did. Total sum stolen: USD7-8 bn (MYR28 – 32 bn, current rates, 23-26 bn then).

KWAP’s money straight into SRC International is 4 bn ringgit, intended, on paper, to go deep into Mongolia. (Najib Razak’s penchant for Mongolians; Altantuya all over again!)

At 4 bn, the theft at SRC, once a 1MDB subsidiary, which is considered a given, would appear like small beer. But, that’s precisely the point. A thousand ringgit or a million ringgit still gets those fraudsters jail time. Add three, four or five more charges from the Penal Code and the MACC Act, that should lock up the thieves for good.

In SRC therefore, nailing the thieves ought to be easiest. How so? Mainly, it’s this: because money was drawn from within Malaysia and assuming there’s just one lump sum, snatched in one swipe, the SRC fraud would be straightforward. It has almost nothing in 1MDB’s international character, money flows, complexity and surrogate persons in the money trail. Little or almost no money laundering, no real estate, no fund units, no art pieces, no yachts, no gambling debts to trace, no ‘dissipation’ of money on American celebrities, Mongolian girls, Thai policemen, Singaporean bankers and Arab turkeys. Therefore, not as circuitous.

Once money is taken out of, say, 1MDB, a hole is created, a billion missing this year, three billion the next. Auditors looked into these holes and Arul Kanda will make up a story to get them off his back. Hence, added to the theft is document forgery, falsification of records, criminal misrepresentation, money laundering, all of the things that contributed to make the 1MDB fraud look convoluted, therefore difficult to sink your teeth in.

Not so with SRC.

Getting to the hows of the SRC scam is a straight road, therefore, invaluable to investigators because of this: the financial routing and transactions and those physical and manual records are easy to trace, pin down, and extracted. The banks are right next door. Ultimately, it’s money out KWAP, money into pocket, with some pocket change for couriers in between.

In SRC, too, Najib’s defense or excuses is also weakest. Example: “Datuk Seri, MYR42 mn was found in your bank account. Explain. If you don’t mind. Tolong, tolong?”

His answer wasn’t some fictitious Saudi piece of turkey donation. Nor could thatpondan named Azalina Othman cook up some ‘political donation’ story. Najib’s answer, via Apandi, was this instead:

“Gosh! It’s been ages since I checked the account. Swear to God, I had no idea! How could anyone do such a thing. It’s a Manchester Conspiracy.” (The only thing he skipped when pretending incredulity was that Allah could be so kind and generous. Zap! Here’s donation for you, boy; reward for being a saint!)

We have always been working backwards: Ah! Najib, there is 681 mn in your AmBank. Explain! Tony Pua has no manners talking to Abang like that.

But here is the problem following this line of inquiry: if we say Najib has stolen, then stolen from where? Who is the victim? Prove it!

Going back, Najib’s 1MDB defense so far is two fold: On the one side, a princely donation; added to which, political donation. And, on the other part, 1MDB has said nothing has been stolen. But, if 1MDB is itself the thief then the USD681 mn case-claim collapses.

That is, no one dialed 999, reporting money stolen from the House of 1MDB.

This, however, explains why the US allegation has been so devastating, beating even Singapore’s because the latter catches only the middle part that involved primarily the bankers and some Eric Tan middlemen. The Americans, on the other hand, traces, with evidence record, the beginning to end.

Problem there. Najib can’t be nailed down because neither the act of the theft/corruption (the beginning) and of the destination of the 1MDB loot (the end) had occurred on US soil. Malaysian Official 1 was the best option for US investigators. Their case, against Najib, is in part circumstantial therefore. The circumstantial being the middling part of money laundering, Jho Low, Riza Aziz, Goldman Sachs, and so on.

The problem in nailing down Najib returns to Malaysia. And getting SRC.

The Ghost of SRC

In SRC, we therefore ask the same questions we asked about 1MDB. And this begins from the beginning, the answers to which can be drawn only from information available in the open or otherwise. In Q&A format:

Is money missing from SRC? If no, no case. If yes, how much money in? From where? How much out?

Short answer: Don’t know. Incredibly there is no certain answer because so long as KWAP is repaid, and repaid every sen, plus interest, who is to say there is corruption at or theft from SRC? There’s no hole to look into.

So what are you chasing?

Short answer: A ghost.

What’s this ghost? Has it a name?

Money. Money was seen wandering from SRC International then turning up in Najib’s AmBank account, same account that received 1MDB’s proceeds.

Well, this happens. Ghostly things do happen. So?

What kind of question is that? Are you with us or against us?

Isn’t it best to be neutral especially when there’s a crime?

We think you’re against us.

I’m not against anything or anyone. I’m neutral. Fact is this: no one has reported money stolen. And you’re already saying there is a thief. And even if money is missing, you don’t know where the money originated?

You do have a point. But wait…. We’ll check with Raja Petra Kamarudin. He knows the answer; he knows everything.

[Two days later.] Ah! It’s a conspiracy! RPK says it’s a conspiracy!

How does that work?

Some Chinaman towkay had a secret meeting with the Anti-Najib Coalition in London. They paid off a woman named Clare Rewcastle Brown. And this is what Miss Brown has published about SRC in Sarawak Report (mirror site):

Chart summary above broken down into two parts, as follows:

That’s just a chart. Anybody can draw charts. Even morons, even the Alis and their Apandis.  They don’t prove a thing. Anyway, it doesn’t prove that the SRC money is public, KWAP, money. And where’s the conspiracy?

There’s more. See here:

So?

We got the smoking gun!

What do you mean smoking gun?

Can’t you see? In the face. Public money has gone secretly into a secret ‘anti-ageing secret therapy of the rich and famous‘. Here, it says in the advertisement:

You’re going round in circles. It doesn’t prove a fuck! No wonder, we’re aging.

Wait, don’t make assumptions. Don’t jump to conclusions. There’s more from Miss Brown. We’ll give you the whole thing, to stop your stupid whining:

***

EXCLUSIVE

RM1 mn Spent On ‘Anti-Ageing’

*

Products for “B1 and Wife”!

Further leaked documents from the Malaysian enquiries into 1MDB have been made available to Sarawak Report, which indicate that the Prime Minister and his wife utilised over RM1.15 million of the fund’s stolen cash on purchasing hormone-based, anti-ageing products from the US!

They make clear that whilst the PM is referred to by the Department of Justice investigators at “Malaysian Official 1″, he was dubbed “B1″ by domestic MACC investigators, who had zeroed in on money that passed from the 1MDB subsidiary SRC, via two intermediary companies, into accounts belonging to Najib.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) enquiry into 1MDB focussed on the local diversions of SRC cash, which had been originally raised from a RM4 billion from the public pension fund KWAP.

The MACC established that altogether some RM70 million was siphoned from SRC’s borrowed cash into a series of AmBank accounts belonging to Najib between summer 2014 and early 2015.

However, after sacking the former Attorney General, who was on the point of bringing charges last July, Najib installed his ally, Apandi Ali, who dismissed the charges and ruled the case was closed.

Najib has admitted he did receive the money, but Apandi accepted his excuse that he had not realised that the millions of dollars had come from 1MDB/SRC rather than his “Saudi donor” (money he originally claimed he’d never put to personal use).

The Prime Minister has not been required to pay the money back.

Such looting from SRC may seem small beer compared to the billion dollars that arrived in Najib’s bank accounts from abroad – money now also confirmed by the DOJ as having originated from thefts from 1MDB.

However, SRC was a home-based investigation and it is significant that Najib has just completed his moves to protect himself by removing all top three officers from their posts at the MACC.  The organisation had originally challenged Apandi’s judgement that there was nothing illegal involved.

Meanwhile, the public prosecutor Kevin Morais, who had earlier leaked the charge sheet against the Prime Minister to Sarawak Report was kidnapped and found brutally murdered in a drum of solidified cement.

The world’s most expensive beauty product?

Documents now obtained from that MACC investigation show the outcome of enquiries by officials into some of the expenditures made from these accounts.

These include a cheque for RM1,154,000 that was made out from account number 2112022011906 to a certain Datuk Sadiq bin Mohammed on February 4th 2015:

Notes attached to the photocopied cheques suggest that investigators asked Datuk Sidiq the purpose of the payment:

“Pembelian 2 set ubat jenis Plantserum External Apllication Food based GH-9 Honey Softgel dan Food GH-9 Honey Soft Gel pada harga USD159,000 setiap satu set utk kegunaan B1 dan isteri”

This translates:

“The purchase of 2 sets of medication type External Plant Serum Food Application based softgel GH-9 Honey and Honey Food GH-9 Soft Gel at USD159,000 each set for the use of B1 and wife”

Who are B1 and Wife?

As with the DOJ indictment the rest of the document leaves little doubt as to whom the investigators meant by “B1 and Wife”.

Because, the next items of expenditure examined from these accounts include several building works and alterations at addresses which are known to belong to Najib Razak and his wife.  These include, for example, RM100,000 for construction work on a police guard room and amenities at their KL residence made payable to an outfit called ABS Trend Master Sdn Bhd on 16th February 2015:

This payment also has a note attached:

“Kerja-kerja pembinaan satu unit pondok polis (dengan bilik mandi dan cabinet), satu tempat pembuangan sampah konkirt dan satu bilik sebaguna (dengan bilik mandi dan cabinet) di rumah B1 No 11 Jalan Langgak Duta Taman Duta KL”

Which translates:

“Construction work of the police post unit (with bathroom and cabinet), concrete landfills and a multi-purpose room (with bathroom and cabinet) in B1 house No 11 Jalan Taman Duta Duta Langgak KL”

It is of little surprise that the expenditures from these accounts, were for the benefit of the “first couple”, given that Najib has admitted that this and the other accounts were in his name.

His excuse is merely that he did not know where the money had come from, which his hand-picked AG ruled acceptable (in a decision that has been challenged not only by the MACC but by the Bar Council for being an unconstitutional abuse of his powers and authority).

What will leave Malaysians surely gasping is how two doses of any serum and oral product could cost such a huge amount of money?

Sarawak Report has not succeeded in tracking on the open market any product that begins to cost as much USD159,000 each – yet at contemporary exchange rates the price tag described appears to match the RM1,154,000 on the cheque.

The most likely explanation is that the ‘GH-9′ description refers to the ‘Growth Factor 9′ hormone, currently touted as being all the rage as an anti-ageing product for the ‘super-rich’.  The highly controversial drug is banned for athletes.

So, perhaps B1 or his wife can enlighten Malaysians what exactly this public money was indeed spent on, because the MACC reporting notes make clear the investigators themselves found it hard to determine what genuine investments SRC have actually been making with the RM4 billion borrowed from KWAP.

Ironically, it can be seen that the MACC investigation notes themselves quote research from Sarawak Report, as they attempt to find out what on earth the company has been up to in the absence of publicly available information.

This was the very ‘sin’ that UMNO spokesman Rahman Dahlan accused the DOJ of just last week!

On a parting note – if this million ringgit mystery product was indeed promoted as an anti-ageing beauty treatment for Malaysia’s ‘First Couple’, might Malaysians not be eligible for a substantial refund on grounds of poor performance and a breech of trade descriptions?

[Sigh] Now, are we done? You are wasting my time with this talk of conspiracy and with that woman. What’s the name? Miss Brown? First you say SRC money. Then you say 1MDB. This is clearly a plot against the prime minister, against a Patriot. And you just gave me the proof. I’m going to report you to Khalid Abu Bakar. I’ll send him a tweet. Right away!

You can’t do that. Everything here is false. You’ll be lodging a false report with false documents. You are the Plotter! You’re the Conspirator! You’re the neutral-impostor! You’re Tan Keng Liang! Traitor!

For Annie: You Must Choose

Two roads diverged in a wood…

And I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Interpretation: Two roads forked out before me, which one do I choose? A hint to the answer appears to be in Stanza 1, lines 4 and 5, then Stanza 2. Quoting:’ …long I stood / and looked down one as far as I could / … / then took the other, as just as fair / and having perhaps the better claim…’

At the fork in the junction, neutrality, or not choosing, is not permitted. Yet there is no knowing which is the right road to choose: one looks as good as the other. We can only know if the choice is the right one, in the future, and that’s not even with any certainty because the other road has never been tried. But simply choosing one, taking the one less traveled, the one we trust the lesser, the one less obvious, less safe, makes all the difference in knowing, in the end, which should have been chosen.

There is no right or wrong in the moment of choosing. That comes only in hindsight, and even then ‘I shall be telling this with a sigh / somewhere ages and ages hence…’ because the other road had looked ‘just as fair’.

- shuzheng.wordpress.com