Ex-Malaysian prime minister guilty of money laundering, abuse of power
Eileen Ng
Malaysia’s former prime minister, Najib Razak, has been found guilty of corruption related to the multibillion-dollar plunder of state investment fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).
The country’s Supreme Court found Najib, 72, guilty on Friday of four abuse of power and 21 money laundering charges related to nearly 2.2 billion ringgit ($810 million) transferred from the 1MDB fund to his personal bank accounts.
Najib’s defense team was expected to present their arguments before sentencing later on Friday.
Najib has denied any wrongdoing and maintained that the funds were a political donation from Saudi Arabia and that he was misled by rogue financiers led by Low Taek Jho. Low, thought to be the mastermind of the scandal, remains at large.
Judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah said Najib’s claim of Saudi donations was “incredible”. He said the four letters purporting to come from the Saudi donor were fake and that the evidence clearly showed the funds came from 1MDB.
He rejected defense claims that Najib was an unwitting victim duped by former 1MDB officials and Low. The judge said witness statements pointed to an “undoubted link” between Najib and Low, who played a key role in the scandal and acted as a “proxy, conduit, intermediary and facilitator” for Najib at 1MDB.
The judge said Najib failed to take steps to verify the source of the huge funds and failed to take action against Low. Instead, Najib used the money despite its questionable origins and took steps to protect his position, including sacking the then attorney general and anti-corruption chief who investigated the case.
“The defendant was not a country bumpkin,” said Sequerah, who spent five hours reading the verdict. “Therefore, any attempt to portray the defendant as hopelessly ignorant of the evil going on around him will fail miserably.”
The decision marked a major turning point in one of the world’s biggest financial scandals, which has spread across global markets and triggered investigations in the United States and other countries.
Dressed in a blue suit, Najib appeared calm and occasionally wrote in his notebook.
Najib, who served as prime minister from 2009 to 2018, is currently serving a prison sentence after being convicted in an earlier case linked to the 1MDB scandal that led to his government’s defeat in 2018.
In 2020, he was sentenced to 12 years in prison for abuse of power, breach of trust and money laundering, involving millions of dollars transferred into his accounts from SRC International, a former unit of 1MDB.
His sentence began in August 2022 after he lost the final appeal, becoming Malaysia’s first former leader to be imprisoned. The Pardons Board, a body that advises executives on pardons, cut his sentence in half and substantially reduced it in 2024.
Najib established the 1MDB development fund shortly after taking office in 2009. He chaired 1MDB’s advisory board and had veto power as finance minister during his tenure as prime minister.
Between 2009 and 2014, Najib’s top executives and associates looted more than $4.5 billion from the fund, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Najib’s lawyer said they plan to appeal. Najib, who is expected to be released in August 2028 after his sentence is reduced, now faces a longer prison sentence.
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