Najib withdraws bribery allegations against judge Mohd Nazlan

 

Najib Abdul Razak has withdrawn allegations of bribery against Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali - the High Court judge who convicted the former prime minister in the SRC International case.

Najib, 69, made the withdrawal in his further affidavit-in reply filed at the Federal Court on Friday (Aug 5) via Messrs Zaid Ibrahim Suflan T H Liew & Partners.

“For the record, I categorically withdraw any interpretation of what I said which may be taken to mean that Justice Mohd Nazlan was investigated for possible bribery,” said Najib (above).

At another point in the affidavit, Najib also said, “As regards to the allegations of bribery, I again state that I withdraw them.”

However, Najib continued to insist that there is additional evidence which will show a serious conflict of interest by the judge and said this was why he was seeking a retrial of the entire SRC case.

Najib was responding to the prosecution’s affidavit last month (July 21), which mentioned that Najib’s purported personal knowledge of MACC investigations on justice Nazlan cannot be true.

This is as the independent enforcement agency would not disclose confidential information relating to an ongoing investigation, the prosecution contended.

Recently, the prosecution in Najib’s SRC case claimed that the allegations by Najib against trial judge Nazlan, who is now a Court of Appeal judge, were a desperate attempt to nullify the trial.

On April 21 this year, Nazlan made a police report over an article published by a news portal titled ‘Judge Mohd Nazlan being investigated for unexplained RM1 million in his bank account’.

The judge denied the accusation, describing it as a malicious intent to undermine his credibility as a Court of Appeal Judge and to disrupt the justice system.

Only July 28, 2020, Nazlan convicted and sentenced Najib to 12 years in jail and a RM210 million fine for misappropriating RM42 million of SRC International Bhd funds.

The case is at the final appeal stage in the Federal Court after the Court of Appeal upheld the verdict of the High Court and rejected the appeal of the former prime minister.

The apex court set 10 days, starting next Monday (Aug 15), to hear Najib's final appeal.

- Bernama