Najib rejects ex-CEO Hazem’s claim 1MDB was a ‘tool for Umno funding’, says projects not for personal or political gain
KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 10 — Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak today denied that the Finance Ministry-owned company 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) and its projects are for his benefit or for his party Umno’s benefit.
Najib disagreed with former 1MDB CEO Mohd Hazem Abd Rahman’s previous court testimony of 1MDB projects being a “tool to get funds for Datuk Seri Najib and Umno”.
“I strongly disagree with the assertion, 1MDB or its project ventures were not for my benefit nor for Umno,” Najib told the High Court while testifying in his defence in his 1MDB trial.
Hazem had said Malaysian fugitive Low Taek Jho —- better known as Jho Low —- was the one who arranged and manipulated all decisions, investments, joint ventures, finances and fundraising involving 1MDB projects as a tool for Najib and Umno.
Hazem said he had personally heard this from Low, and Low had trusted him as he was a good friend of Najib’s then principal private secretary Datuk Azlin Alias.
Najib, who is a former Umno president, however, said today that 1MDB proposals were deliberated by its board of directors and had been brought to the 1MDB board by legitimate entities on the advice of advisers such as Goldman Sachs, BSI Bank and the Baker McKenzie group.
Najib said 1MDB’s problem was instead a systemic failure with how the company’s management executed decisions starting from 1MDB’s former CEO Datuk Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi until Hazem’s time.
