A company’s managing director facing a RM7.5 million graft case linked to former communications and multimedia minister Annuar Musa obtained court leave for temporary passport release for his business trips to the US and Berlin, Germany.
The Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court this morning allowed Hydroshoppe managing director Abdul Hamid Shaikh Abdul Razak Shaikh’s application for temporary release of the passport from today until March 21.
Judge Suzana Hussin’s greenlight was given following no objections by deputy public prosecutor Rasyidah Murni.
Hamid’s defence counsel Weera Premananda submitted that the accused seeks temporary release of the court-impounded passport as he (Hamid) needed to undertake two separate overseas business trips.
The lawyer said one trip is to the US from tomorrow until March 1, and the second one to Berlin from March 5 to 7 for a business event linked to the tourism industry.
Weera pointed out that his client had always abided by the terms of his bail condition, which included surrendering his passport to court.
When Suzana asked the prosecutors about the matter, Rasyidah said they had studied the interim passport return application and had no objection against it.
The court then permitted the passport to be released to Hamid (above), and ordered the accused to return the passport by March 21.
On April 5 last year, Hamid claimed trial in the graft case of offering the bribes as inducement for Annuar to expedite a proposed sale of shares and a concession takeover from Menara Kuala Lumpur Sdn Bhd.
According to the charge under Section 16(b)(B) of the MACC Act 2009, Hamid, whose company had taken over the concession for the maintenance of the KL Tower, was accused of offering RM500,000 a year for 15 years to Annuar through MyCreative Ventures director Tan Ser Lay.
He was accused of making the offer between July and August 2022 at the Communication and Multimedia Ministry in Putrajaya.
The court had released Hamid on RM50,000 bail and ordered him to report to the MACC headquarters in Kuala Lumpur once every two months until the disposal of the case. He was also ordered to surrender his passport to the court.
Previously, MACC was reported to have investigated allegations over the suspicious sale of shares and the takeover of KL Tower maintenance concession from Menara Kuala Lumpur, a company wholly owned by Telekom Malaysia.
It was also reported that Telekom Malaysia said it decided not to continue holding the concession to manage the KL Tower to focus on its core business, which is telecommunication services.
Before a separate Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court presided by judge Rozina Ayob, Hydroshoppe faced a corruption charge under Section 17(A)(1)(a) of the MACC Act. - Mkini
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