AUDIT TAMPERING TRIAL | The prosecution will call 11 more witnesses in the 1MDB audit report tampering trial of former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak and former 1MDB CEO Arul Kanda Kandasamy, the Kuala Lumpur High Court heard today.
Lead DPP Gopal Sri Ram informed judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan of this during court proceedings this afternoon.
"Eleven is a safe (number),” Sri Ram said at the end of proceedings this afternoon.
The DPP was replying to a query by Zaini on how many more witnesses the prosecution would be calling to help the court fix further trial dates for the case.
Previously, seven witnesses testified for the prosecution, among them being former chief secretary to the government Ali Hamsa, former auditor-general Ambrin Buang, and National Audit Department (NAD) officers Nafisah Saadatul Bashir Ahmad and Nor Salwani Muhammad.
The court today then fixed Nov 30 and to Dec 3, Dec 7 to 10 as well as April 5 to 8 and April 12 to 15 next year for the trial to resume.
Earlier, during proceedings today, the judge had informed parties that the previously scheduled hearing date for tomorrow would be vacated.
Zaini directed for the vacating of tomorrow’s trial date following today’s earlier announcement from the Office of the Chief Registrar of the Federal Court that hearings of cases at the civil and criminal courts in Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Putrajaya from tomorrow until Oct 27 would be suspended.
The suspension was made following the coming into force of the conditional movement control order for Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Putrajaya beginning midnight tonight.
During this afternoon’s proceedings, the fourth prosecution witness, NAD director Nor Salwani identified the audio recording of a crucial meeting held on Feb 24, 2016.
The meeting was the one where a decision was purportedly made for the removal of certain potentially controversial issues from the 1MDB audit report.
Nor Salwani made the identification after having listened to the full playback of the audio recording during proceedings before Zaini.
Previously, she had testified that she made a recording of the Feb 24 meeting purportedly attended by Arul Kanda, Ali and several other officials, among others.
During questioning by DPP Ahmad Akram Gharib this afternoon, Nor Salwani confirmed the voices of several attendees at the Feb 24 meeting.
Akram: In this recording, could you identify the voices of Ambrin Buang, Saadatul Nafisah, Arul Kanda, Shukry (Mohd Salleh, Najib’s former principal private secretary) Isa (Mohamad Isa Hussain, then Treasury deputy secretary-general) and Norazman (Ayob, who was then Ali Hamsa's senior private secretary)?
Nor Salwani: Correct.
Akram then applied to the court for the content of the two-hour-and-forty-minute audio recording to be admitted as evidence. In previous proceedings, only the pen drive containing the audio recording was tendered as evidence.
Zaini allowed the prosecution’s application after the defence team of Najib and Arul Kanda replied that they tentatively had no objection.
Muhammad Shafee Abdullah and N Sivananthan acted for Najib and Arul Kanda respectively.
Najib is charged with using his position to order amendments to the 1MDB audit report before it was presented to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to avoid any action being taken against him.
Co-accused Arul Kanda is charged with abetting Najib in making the amendments to the report.
Both were charged under Section 23(1) of the MACC Act 2009 which specifies a jail term not exceeding 20 years and a fine of no less than five times the amount of gratification or RM10,000, whichever is higher. - Mkini
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