Former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak had expressed his annoyance with news headlines that wrongly linked him with the off-shore bank accounts recently exposed by the Pandora Papers.
“No. I’m not (linked) and don’t own offshore bank accounts.
“I merely answered reporters who asked how did law firm Wong & Co got appointed by 1MDB,” he explained in a Twitter post.
Najib said that Wong & Co is part of international law firm Baker McKenzie, the firm at the centre of the Panama Papers exposé, but that it was appointed along with Goldman Sachs, Ambank, KPMG etc by the Terengganu Investment Authority (TIA) before he became prime minister and got involved.
“This happened before TIA became 1MDB,” he explained.
“As they are well-known international firms and had already started work at TIA, I assume the directors and management continued with them when TIA became 1MDB.
“I had zero involvement in selecting and appointing any of these firms. That’s the management’s job,” he said.
Further confusion may have arisen from the fact that Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati was named in the Pandora Papers as owning an offshore firm in Panama called Hessvile, through which he bought a property in Monaco worth 7 million euros.
The Pandora Papers obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) revealed the financial secrets of 35 current and former world leaders, more than 330 politicians and public officials in 91 countries and territories.
Among those listed were former finance minister Daim Zainuddin, Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz, Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, and Selayang MP William Leong.
Yesterday, Dewan Rakyat speaker Azhar Azizan Harun rejected an emergency motion by PKR president Anwar Ibrahim to urgently debate the exposé, saying the matter should instead be looked into by the Parliament Select Committee (PSC) (Economy), or even a Royal Commission of Inquiry. - Mkini
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.