MACC confirms Singaporean businessman under probe

 

MACC said the Singaporean businessman had been instructed to declare his assets and his family’s financial holdings.

PETALING JAYA: A Singaporean businessman and property developer has been questioned in relation to an ongoing “high-profile” investigation, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) has confirmed.

“The businessman has also been instructed to declare his assets and his family’s financial holdings,” said MACC’s anti-money laundering division director Zamri Zainul Abidin.

“I can confirm that more people are expected to be called in for questioning in the near future as part of this investigation.”

While he did not reveal the identity of the Singaporean, Singapore’s CNA news portal earlier reported that businessman and property developer Akbar Khan was being probed by MACC in relation to its investigation into former finance minister Daim Zainuddin.

Citing senior MACC sources and lawyers familiar with the matter, CNA said investigators had temporarily detained Akbar for questioning last week after raiding his home and business premises in Kuala Lumpur.

CNA also reported that MACC had frozen Akbar’s business and personal accounts, and ordered him to declare his assets as well as his family’s financial holdings.

Akbar’s office has declined to comment on the investigation’s specifics, with a spokesman telling CNA that their primary focus “remains on ensuring a fair investigation”.

Investigators are reportedly looking into the alleged repatriation of frozen shares valued at US$4 billion (RM18.75 billion) once listed in the Central Limit Order Book (CLOB), Singapore’s now-defunct over-the-counter market that traded mainly in Malaysian shares.

They are also said to be probing a change in shareholding at conglomerate Multi-Purpose Holdings Bhd in the late 1990s.

MACC is reportedly also looking into an MPHB unit’s US$140 million loan to British Virgin Islands entities Eightybridge United SA and Strykers Development Inc, which were used to acquire controlling blocks of MPHB shares from tycoon Lim Thian Kiat.

In January, Daim was charged with failing to declare to MACC his ownership of 71 assets, including 38 companies, 19 plots of land in Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Pahang, Kedah and Kuala Lumpur, as well as six properties.

Meanwhile, his wife, Naimah Khalid, claimed trial to a charge of failing to comply with an MACC notice requiring the declaration of assets. - FMT