Datuk Seri Najib Razak admitted that his two personal credit cards were used in 2014 for transactions worth RM3.3 million in a single day at a Swiss luxury jeweller’s store in Italy, but has alleged that the money was splashed out on gifts for a mysterious unnamed royalty.
Just hours after a senior bank officer confirmed in court the 10 transactions totalling €763,500 (equivalent to RM3,364,670.65 based on exchange rates then), Najib publicly announced what he claimed the spending at jeweller De Grisogono was for, but coyly denied links to two countries often mentioned in the 1MDB fiasco.
“This spending is for gifts to a senior member of the royalty of a government and their entourage that has good relations with our country (Not Saudi Arabia or Abu Dhabi).
“Their family and entourage were with us in our family’s visit to Italy then,” Najib wrote in a Facebook post last night but did not name the alleged foreign country that the purported “gift” recipient belonged to.
“It is a norm to give gifts to leaders of other governments,” he said, adding that it was usually the government which would bear the costs of such gifts but he had then “paid with my credit cards”.
“The purchase and giving of the gift on August 8, 2014, also received a response via a letter dated August 15, 2014, from the gift recipient,” he claimed, posting a faint and slightly grainy copy of the purported letter addressed to Najib’s wife with the given title “Mrs Rosmah Mansor”.
Najib said he had blocked out the name of the alleged gift recipient as it would be unfair for the name to be used publicly, but claimed that the original copy of the letter would be presented in court as evidence and that his lawyer would then provide explanations.
“As this SRC case is still under trial, I am not able to explain further at this time,” he said, referring to his ongoing trial over former 1Malaysia Development Berhad unit SRC International Sdn Bhd’s funds.
In his Facebook post, Najib did not explain why the RM3.3 million was charged on his two credit cards via 10 separate smaller transactions, or explain the source of funds that were used to pay for the RM3.3 million bill.
In the same Facebook post yesterday, Najib claimed he seldom used these credit cards and alleged that the RM3.3 million was his biggest spending for the cards.
“The entire credit limit of RM3 million was used in one day on August 8, 2014.
“It should also be stressed that this is not SRC’s credit card but credit cards under my name,” the Pekan MP said.