Datuk Shukri Abdull said he never acted on orders from the Cabinet when he led the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), after a minster alleged a businessman’s bank account was unfrozen on Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s request.
Responding to Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Parliament and Law) Datuk Takiyuddin Hassan assertion that Dr Mahathir and former finance minister Lim Guan Eng had interfered in the MACC’s investigation into a businessman over the 1MDB scandal, Shukri said he always acted with integrity.
“In any investigation, I will not comply with any instructions, including the minister or PM.
“Similarly, in this case, I never issued an order to my officers to remove the freeze of related accounts,” he said in a statement.
Shukri added that if the account in question was indeed unfrozen, it was not on his orders.
He added that as the head of the MACC, he only took instructions from the Attorney General’s Chambers.
During his winding-up speech on the royal address in Parliament yesterday, Takiyuddin read out a handwritten note on which he said Dr Mahathir had remarked on businessman Tan Sri Lim Soon Peng’s letter of representation asking MACC to unfreeze his bank account.
At that time, Soon Peng’s bank accounts had been frozen due to investigations into RM4 million in transactions relating to1MDB-linked funds from former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.
Takiyuddin said Guan Eng had also written on the letter to ask the AG at the time, Tan Sri Tommy Thomas, to respond to the request.
The minister said Thomas subsequently wrote to Guan Eng on May 31, 2019, to say the account was restored after Soon Peng agreed to return the amount in illicit proceeds allegedly received from Najib.
Shukri returned to MACC in May 2018 after originally retiring in 2016 at the height of the 1MDB scandal under Barisan Nasional, during which the leadership of the commission was replaced.
He resigned in June 2019 and was replaced by former PKR member and lawyer, Latheefa Koya who resigned along with Thomas after the Pakatan Harapan administration collapsed in February. – MMO