Lawyer: Arul Kanda 'happy’ to testify against Najib in 1MDB audit report trial
KUALA LUMPUR, June 14 — Former 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) CEO Arul Kanda Kandasamy would “happily agree” to the prosecution’s application for him to testify as its witness against former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak in a corruption trial here, his lawyer said today.
Arul Kanda’s lawyer, Datuk N. Sivananthan, informed the High Court that his client — who is currently also an accused person in the same trial as Najib — was prepared to stand by his previous statement to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) during investigations for this case.
High Court judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan was asking whether Arul Kanda was agreeable to the prosecution’s application to have him appear as a witness.
“The position my client is taking, he has given his statement to the MACC when he was investigated, his position has always been and is now he's prepared to take the position that that statement he's given the prosecution, he's prepared to stand by those statement, if that is what the prosecution wants, he would happily agree,” Sivananthan replied.
The judge then remarked, “So, in English, it means yes”.
Mohamed Zaini went on to confirm that Arul Kanda agreed to be a prosecution witness.
The High Court will decide on June 24 whether to allow the prosecution’s application to call in Arul Kanda as a prosecution witness in this trial, after having heard arguments from the prosecution and also Najib’s lead defence lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah.
On May 20, the prosecution filed its written application under Section 63 of the MACC Act 2009 to call Arul Kanda in as a witness.
Under Section 63(1), in a situation where two or more people are charged with an offence under the MACC Act, the court may require one or more of them to give evidence as witnesses for the prosecution if a written application is made by the public prosecutor.
Section 63(3) provides that every person accused under the MACC Act and required to give evidence as prosecution witness “shall be entitled to receive a certificate of indemnity”, if the court finds that he has made a “true and full discovery” of all things to which he was examined on, with this certificate to be a bar to all legal proceedings against him over such matters.
In other words, Arul Kanda could be acquitted and discharged if he testifies as a prosecution witness and if the High Court decides to give him a certificate of indemnity.
In this trial, Najib is accused of having as then prime minister and then finance minister abused his position between February 22, 2016 and February 26, 2016 to receive self-gratification in the form of protection from civil or criminal action over his role in the handling of 1MDB operations, by instructing for amendments to the auditor-general’s report on 1MDB — which was already finalised and ready to be presented to the parliamentary watchdog Public Accounts Committee (PAC) — before it was finally presented to the PAC.
Arul Kanda was charged with abetting Najib, but the prosecution had on the first day of trial already said it would file an application in the future to have Arul Kanda be a prosecution witness at an appropriate stage of the trial.
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